A little over a year after its opening, Amy’s Kitchen’s San Jose, Calif., frozen food plant will close in September, the victim of the worsening economy, supply chain issues and labor problems. 300 jobs will be lost.
“With the inflation that’s going on, we had a huge increase in costs,” Fred Scarpulla, the company’s acting chief operating officer, told the San Jose Mercury News. “We had supply chain disruptions, we experienced a lot of staff turnover and labor shortages. A lot of things disrupted production and created startup problems.”
The plant began production in March 2021, primarily making frozen pizzas. “We ordered a crucial piece of equipment that we really needed for production and it just showed up this week,” Scarpulla told the newspaper.
Capital expenses, primarily for building materials and equipment, were double what the company anticipated, the Mercury News reported. The factory was losing $1 million a month for the past 6-8 months.
A Teamsters unionization drive that started at the company’s Santa Rosa plant began to organize workers at San Jose.
