Goodman Fielder takes knife to NZ meat operation

Goodman Fielder has confirmed plans to close its Frankton, Hamilton meat factory as part of a broader strategy to exit non-core markets.

In January the company announced plans to sell its meat and pizza businesses in New Zealand, to smallgoods manufacturer, Hellers, and Mommas Frozen Products respectively, for around $A14 million.

At the time it flagged the possibility that the Frankton facility could be closed, and today it confirmed that the plant will close by the end of March, resulting in 125 job losses.

“We have had to make the very difficult recommendation to close the facility at Frankton,” said the company's CEO, Chris Delaney, in January.

“Our strategic commitment is to focus our capital and marketing expenditure on our core categories and our meats business is not core to Goodman Fielder. The proposal to sell also reflects the very difficult trading environment and market conditions which have existed for the meats business for some time. We explored a number of alternative possibilities; however, none of these were viable which has led to this decision,” he said.

According to today's announcement, production will be moved to Heller's facilities in Christchurch and Auckland. The Frankton factory will continue to be used by Goodman Fielder as a distribution hub.