The maker of Golden Wonder crisps is expected to close its popcorn factory in Plymouth and move production to Northern Ireland.
Bosses at snack giant Tayto Group, which is head-quartered in both County Armagh and Corby in the Midlands, said they have yet to make a final decision on the closure of the Portlebay Popcorn plant on the Langage industrial estate in Plympton, but have confirmed they are considering quitting Devon.
Sources have told Business Live the Plymouth factory, quaintly known as The Poppery, is doomed and is scheduled to shut in December 2019 with production shifted to Tayto’s base in the Northern Irish town of Tandragee.
Its closure will be a blow to Plymouth, the brand was born on the fringes of the city and every packet even contains the line “hand popped in Devon”.
A Tayto spokesman was only able to say: “This is a delicate and difficult time for our colleagues at the Portlebay site and therefore we are only able to confirm that we have entered into consultation with the colleagues on site regarding a proposal to move the production of popcorn from Plympton to our Northern Ireland site in Tandragee. As no decisions have been made yet it would be inappropriate to comment further.”
It is understood the jobs of nine full-time production, warehouse and admin workers are under consultation, but if the factory shuts a number of casual workers would lose their jobs too.
Brexit news...
The reason for the redundancies has not been revealed but staff have said the factory’s location in the deep South West is pertinent, with the cost of shipping the popcorn to other locations being a contributory factor.
One source at the company told Business Live that the mood in the Plymouth plant was “awful” and staff were “shell shocked”.
Most Read
“It’s really sad,” said the source. “Morale is awful. They (management) have said they don’t know if it is going (to close), but because of logistics costs they are thinking of moving. It is more expensive in Plymouth. It’s such as shame for the staff.”
Portlebay has become a key product for Plymouth, being founded and established in the city as an indigenous brand alongside products such as Princess Yachts, Plymouth Gin and Burts Snacks.
The popcorn business was established in 2012 by Jonty White, Neil Adams and Stuart Wardlaw and began supplying supermarkets the following year. Its popcorn was soon being sold by companies such as Tesco, Budgens and Booths.
The name was inspired by Portlemouth Bay near Salcombe where Mr White and his daughter Tilly went sailing.
Mr White had previously been associated with another Plymouth snack-maker: Burts, which he acquired with Nick Hurst in 2000 and grew into an international success.
Portlebay launched such flavours such as orchard wood smoked cheddar, wasabi and sweet ginger, cinnamon swirl and lemon sherbet.
But the company, officially named WWA Food Ltd, fell into difficulties and went into administration in February 2017.
Don’t miss
Want more business news straight to your inbox?
BusinessLive is your home for business news from around the country - and you can stay in touch with all the latest news through our email alerts.
You can sign up to receive morning news bulletins from every region we cover and to weekly email bulletins covering key economic sectors from manufacturing to technology and enterprise. And we'll send out breaking news alerts for any stories we think you can't miss.
Visit our email preference centre to sign up to all the latest news from BusinessLive.
It was then acquired by snacking giant Tayto Group, which owns brands such as Golden Wonder and Ringos, with Mr White, Mr Adams and Mr Wardlaw all now understood to have left Portlebay.
In August 2017 a deal was signed to sell Portlebay’s handcrafted kracklecorn in Denmark with international convenience retailer Circle K taking the products.
The deal came hot on the heels of the firm signing an agreement to supply four flavours in its premium popcorn range to 70 Co-op stores in the South West of England. The popcorn has also been sold in Lidl, Sainsbury’s, and The Range.