Carvel to shut Marlborough ice cream cake plant.

Carrel reports that it will shut its Celebration Foods ice cream cake plant in Marlborough, MA sometime in early May. Some 90 workers will be laid off with the closing, which follows upon the opening of the company's new, larger production facility in New Britain, CT, a few weeks ago.

That 120,000-square-foot plant has positions for some 225 workers. Although there are no relocation packages offered to the Marlborough plant workers, the company has indicated it give some preference to any workers from the older facility who were interested in relocating. Last year the company reported it would move 40 employees from Rocky Hill, CT headquarters to the New Britain, CT site.

Employees at the Marlborough plant will be given five weeks of severance based on years of service and union contract terms. Celebration Foods notified the Marlborough mayor's office and the Massachusetts Division of Career Services of the impending layoffs within the time frame required by the state's Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification, or WARN, Act. A Rapid Response team from the Division will help workers affected by layoff.

Carvel cited rising commodity costs and operating costs as factors in the decision to close the Marlborough plant. In addition, the older plant could not match the efficiencies of the new facility which was announced last June as part of a major expansion effort for the company, which was projected to include new product lines such as cheesecakes in addition to the traditional Carvel ice creamcakes.

Celebration Foods currently has manufacturing facilities in Maryland and California, as well as the plant to be closed in Massachusetts and the newly constructed Connecticut site. The Massachusetts plant was selected for closing in large part because of its proximity to the new plant. When it announced the construction of the New Britain plant, Carvel noted that the state of Connecticut and the city of New Britain would be providing a $2.6 million low-interest loan for the project, up to $2 million in Urban and Industrial Sites Reinvestment Tax Credits, and local property tax exemptions through the state's Enterprise Zone program.