Bimbo wipes out Sara Lee

Today. we went out to the "used bread" store on Silver Lake Road to stock up on our favorite English Muffin Toasting Bread. The stuff is perfect for breakfast toast, French toast, grilled cheese sandwiches and BLT's. Since we use it almost exclusively, we like to keep plenty on hand. The price at the local grocery stores is close to $4.00--the price at the outlet store is half that much.

                                                                                                                                         

                     (They're small loaves so they don't last long.)
When we got to the Sara Lee Bakery Outlet, there was a handwritten sign on the door that the tiny store will be closing on December 14th. We picked up six loaves of the wonderful stuff and asked the lady at the cash register it they were just moving to a new location. She said that a Mexican Corporation called Bimbo Baking had bought out Sara Lee and they were closing all the outlet stores. (Bimbo also bought out Hostess when they went bankrupt and the famous Twinkies were off the market for a while.)

This is the store where we buy big bags of outdated bread to feed the wildlife in the wooded lot. But more than that, it's the store where charities buy bread to make sandwiches for homeless people. It's the store where many elderly and folks on food stamps go to extend their food budget. I can well imagine that there are customers of that store who have had to rely on it for a large part of their diet.

I don't know who will step in and make up for the loss of the last remaining bakery outlets in the Twin Cities. It will be a hardship on a lot of people--and even worse, this comes at the same time that Food Stamp benefits are being reduced. It seems like the poor just can't catch a break!