Post To Close Cereal Plants in Cobourg, Ontario, and Sparks, Nevada
Post Holdings Inc. has announced it will close two cereal processing plants in its Post Consumer Brands division: one in Cobourg, Ont., Canada, and another in Sparks, Nev.
The company noted in a news release that these moves reflect Post’s need to reduce cereal production capacity in its network. This is the third cereal plant Post has closed in the past year and a half, having shut down its Lancaster, Ohio, facility last year.
“The ready-to-eat cereal category continues to decline,” said Nicolas Catoggio, Post Consumer Brands president and CEO. “To respond to this, we are reducing excess manufacturing capacity and optimizing our North American plant network to better utilize our production capacity.”
The two plants combined employ about 300 workers, and the plants will close by the end of December 2025. Production capabilities will be transferred to other Post facilities.
Post acquired the Cobourg facility in July 2017 along with the Weetabix business, while the Sparks facility came to Post in June 2021 as part of the deal for Treehouse Foods’ RTE cereal business.
The moves to shut down the facilities and transfer production elsewhere are expected to result in annual cost savings of $21 million to $23 million for the company starting in fiscal 2026 — and the transfer and startup of the two plants’ production at other locations is estimated to require capital expenditures of roughly $5 million to $7 million incremental to the previously announced annual guidance of $380 million to $420 million.
