The French multinational Danone will launch this week the process of reducing production and employment at its Salas factory, which will be completed in December with the definitive abandonment of the factory by the company. In the next five days, a first batch of workers will leave the company and also this week the Asturian plant will cease production of Danonino, its main preparation, which it has been manufacturing since the origin of the facility in 1981.
Meanwhile, Danone is continuing talks for the sale of the factory to another operator that is willing to guarantee the continuity of the dairy factory. At the end of September, the plant was visited by a fourth potential suitor, it has now become known. In June, directors of the Portuguese company Prolacto, a subsidiary of the German investment fund Quantum, did so, and in July, two other dairy groups whose identity – like the one that did so two weeks ago – has not transpired.
The plant will continue to produce various desserts until December, including cheese and vanilla flans
Danone, which is advised by the consulting company LHH in the search for possible investors, continues with the negotiations for another dairy group to take over the Salas production center. The continuity of the manufacturing activity is a demand shared by the workers, the City Council of Salas and the Government of Asturias. The closure of the plant in December (announced by Danone on May 5) would have a marked social and economic impact on the territory, and would mean the loss of a relevant industrial asset by southwestern Asturias, which is also directly linked to one of the Asturian productive specialties, such as the dairy sector and the agri-food sector in general, and the rural economy.
The factory in Salta will definitively stop producing Danonino this week, except for its chocolate variety, which it will continue to make for the time being, thus ending 41 years of continuous production of this type of fresh cheese for consumption preferably by children and which became popular in Spain (initially, under the name of Petit Suisse) since its launch first in the old Danone factory in Iraizoz, in the valley and municipality of Ulzama, and immediately in Asturias, which took over from the Navarran plant. Production in Asturias will now be assumed by the multinational’s factory in Pays de Bray (France). Until the total cessation in December, Salas will continue to make desserts, mainly vanilla flan and a cheese flan with a traditional Asturian recipe.
Of the 79 factory employees, about thirty will leave the company at weekends through early retirement. Another batch will be released between November 5 and 7. The total number of early retirements affects 40 people. The first transfers are scheduled for October 30. Of the 19 employees who can be relocated to other factories, two have agreed to go to Madrid and Valencia, another two have rejected the offer and will join the group to be compensated, one has gone to another company and the remaining fourteen will be decided this week.
Company and workers reached an agreement on July 8 for the early retirement of 40 workers and the dismissal with compensation of the remaining thirty. This last group includes the 19 who were likely to be relocated to other factories. The company promised to accompany all those laid off until they find a job either in the plant itself if it is sold, or in other companies or through self-employment formulas.