Bimbo Bakeries USA

Name

The name Bimbo was first coined in 1945 when the company switched from Super Pan S.A. A mixing of the words bingo and Bambi. Bimbo's innocent, childlike associations fit the image the company wished to build. The English word bimbo, with its negative connotations, has no cognate in Spanish.

History

Grupo Bimbo entered the U.S. market with the purchase of Pacific Pride Bakeries in 1996. At the time, Pacific Pride Bakeries was the largest independent baker in the San Diego area. The current company, Bimbo Bakeries USA, was established in 1998 when Grupo Bimbo purchased Mrs. Baird's Bakeries in Texas, which at the time was the largest family owned bakery in the United States, and merged it with the former Pacific Pride Bakeries. At this point, it was renamed Bimbo Bakeries USA and U.S. headquarters were set up in Fort Worth, Texas. In 2002, Grupo Bimbo made another acquisition when it purchased five plants in California, Texas, Colorado, and Oregon. The purchase also gave Bimbo Bakeries USA the right to such brands as Oroweat, Entenmann's, Thomas', and Boboli in the western United States (the rights in the eastern USA at the time were owned by George Weston Limited).

Nationwide expansion

On December 10, 2008, it was announced that Grupo Bimbo was in negotiations to purchase Weston Foods Inc., a subsidiary of George Weston Ltd. for $2.38 billion, a purchase that would make Bimbo Bakeries USA the largest bakery company in the USA. The purchase was finalized on January 21, 2009. The acquisition added brands such as Arnold, Brownberry, Freihofer's, Stroehmann, and gave Bimbo the rights to the Weston brands in the eastern United States (it had controlled the Weston brands in the western United States since 2002). The purchase also added 22 more factories and 4,000 delivery trucks, giving Bimbo Bakeries USA 35 factories and over 7,000 sales routes in the United States, along with a footprint in all of the lower 48 states and almost US$4 billion in annual sales. The Weston Foods headquarters in Horsham, Pennsylvania (just outside Philadelphia) became the new headquarters for Bimbo's USA operations, relocating from Fort Worth, Texas, when the deal closed.

Soccer sponsorship

In an effort to increase its national exposure, on January 11, 2011, Bimbo announced a four-year partnership agreement making it the official jersey sponsor of the Philadelphia Union, the Major League Soccer (MLS) team local to their national headquarters. The Union sponsorship agreement marks the fifth professional soccer team sponsored by Bimbo; the parent company Grupo Bimbo sponsors the following five teams: Rochester Rhinos, Club América, C.D. Guadalajara and C.F. Monterrey of the Primera División de México teams, and C.D. Saprissa of Costa Rica. The deal also makes Bimbo the official bread and baked goods sponsor of the Union and MLS. Bimbo will become an official sponsor of MLS, opening MLS League and Club marketing assets, such as stadium signage, to the company. The sponsorship deal is valued at roughly US$12 million over the four-year period.

Sara Lee acquisition

On November 9, 2010, Grupo Bimbo announced that it had agreed to acquire the North American Fresh Bakery business of the Sara Lee Corporation. The transaction, which was subject to regulatory review, would combine the largest and third largest baking companies in the United States, as measured by annual sales. The deal was reported as costing US$959 million. This acquisition left Bimbo Bakeries USA with 75 bakeries in 31 states, serving the entire continental United States through more than 13,000 sales routes.

The acquisition was estimated to bring approximately US$2.1 Billion in sales to Bimbo Bakeries USA, for a rough total of US$6 billion. This would make Bimbo Bakeries USA more than twice as large as the number two bakery company in the United States, Flowers Foods.

Sara Lee Corp. acquired its fresh baked division in 2001 with the acquisition of Earthgrains for a then industry record of US$2.8 Billion. This sale represents a 66% discount.

In November 2011, Sara Lee Corporation completed the sale of its North American fresh bakery business to Grupo Bimbo for $709 million. Sara Lee also sold its fresh bakery businesses in Spain and Portugal to Grupo Bimbo for 115 million euros ($158.3 million), in a deal announced in October, 2011. That acquisition was expected to close by the end of 2011.

Bimbo Bakeries was required to sell off some of its assets by the antitrust division of the United States Department of Justice. The following operations were sold:

The EarthGrains and Mrs Baird's brands in Kansas City have yet to be sold.

Main brands

Worker safety

The company has been cited for numerous worker safety violations, as well as failure to report worker injuries to California's Division of Occupational Health and Safety. Between 2003 and 2010, nine Bimbo Bakeries workers had parts of digits or a limb amputated after accidents at plants across the state, and regulators found cases of inadequate training and machine guarding.