Pilgrim’s Pride Files Chapter 11 Bankruptcy
Renee -- December 1st, 2008
Chicken producer Pilgrim’s Pride, which has several sites in the local area including a processing plant in Broadway, VA, has filed voluntary petitions for relief under Chapter 11 bankruptcy. News of the bankruptcy comes less than 2 weeks after Pilgrim’s Pride announced it was laying off over 300 workers, and had been given extensions by creditors that were set to expire today.
President and CEO Clint Rivers explained the company’s recent financial troubles in a MarketWatch article: “Over the past year, Pilgrim’s Pride has faced a number of significant challenges including high feed-ingredient costs, an oversupply of chicken, weak market pricing and softening demand.” A notice from Rivers on the pilgrimspride.com homepage emphasizes that the company expects to continue “business as usual” during the restructuring process.
The company employs about 48,000 people across the US and Mexico. The Wall Street Journal says that Pilgrim’s Pride is the first major meat company in the country to disclose serious problems – the industry is expected to be hit hard by rising feed costs and Wall Street’s credit troubles.
It has been noted that the bankruptcy announcement comes exactly 2 years after Pilgrim’s Pride purchased rival GoldKist for $1.1 billion, a move that turned it into the world’s largest poultry production company.
Official information is posted at this website: http://www.kccllc.net/pilgrimspride
PPC Stock information and news updates can be found on Google Finance: http://finance.google.com/finance?q=pilgrim%27s+pride
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