Nothing To Ho Ho About -- Hostess Could Be Out Of Business In Hours

LOS ANGELES (CBSLA.com) — Striking workers could put Hostess brands out of business in a couple of hours.

The makers of Wonder Bread, Twinkies and Ding Dongs might be kaput if the company shuts down.

A closure could cripple the 80-year-old baking giant.

Rob Schmitt, reporting for CBS2 and KCAL9, talked to striking workers outside a Hostess plant in Atwater Village Thursday evening.

He said more than 100 employees at the plant (where Donettes and Ho Ho's are made) took to the picket lines Thursday night.

Schmitt said there was a stand-off between the company and the baker's union. Twenty-four of the company's 36 bakeries have been on strike for four days.

Starting tomorrow, the company will go before a judge and request permission to sell off various assets.

The shutdown could kill thousands of jobs, many in the Southland.

The company is asking workers to take an 8% pay cut but they maintain they have already cut enough.

Employee Bill McEwin said "Unfortunately, much of the money that was used to move the company forward went into pay raises and corporate greed. And now they are asking us for more pay cuts and more concessions."

The company says take the pay cuts, or we close up shop and 18,000 people will be out of work.

Hostess CEO Gregory F. Rayburn said, "It is now up to Hostess' BCTGM (Bakery, Confectionary, Tobacco, Workers and Grain Millers union) represented employees and Frank Hurt, their international president, to decide if they want to call off the strike and save the company, or cause massive financial harm to thousands of employees and their families."