Mission Foods plant in Pueblo to close in October

“The entire facility will be closed, and all employees at the facility will be impacted. This closure is expected to be permanent,” said Mission Foods Human Resources Director Kevin Shuman in the Aug. 14 email to CDLE.

Mission has operated the plant on South Santa Fe Drive in Pueblo since acquiring locally owned “Candy’s Tortillas” in 1994. 

Shuman’s email said 90 employees will be laid off through the closure. Many are represented by the United Food and Commercial Workers Union, Local #7 and will have the opportunity to “displace more junior employees out of their positions” at either a Pueblo-based Mission distribution center or a distribution center in Aurora. The unrepresented employees will lose their jobs. 

"We did not see this coming," said Kim Cordova, President of UFCW Local 7. "What do you do? How do you react to that? This was their career."

Cordova said Mission laid off a similar number of employees at the plant earlier this year. On Friday, Aug. 14, she said the remaining employees were called in for a plant-wide meeting and told of the facility’s full closure without prior notice.

“Workers, some of whom have been at the plant for more than four decades, were told to immediately pack their things and leave, with production having ceased,” a UFCW press release on the closure said.

Federal law requires companies to provide a 60-day notice for layoffs of this size. Employees will continue to receive pay and benefits until the official closure date of Oct. 13.

We’re deeply grateful to our employees and are supporting them as they transition to the next step in their careers,” said a statement from Mission Foods emailed to CPR News. The statement encouraged affected employees to apply to open positions on the company’s website, but did not otherwise give a reason for the closure.

“People raised their family, bought houses,” Cordova said. “It's already hard to find work in Pueblo. This is going to be devastating to the community.”