Maple Leaf Foods to close Brantford processing plant in 2025

Local Journalism Initiative
·1 min read

Maple Leaf Foods has announced plans to close their Brantford processing plant in early 2025.

In a press release Wednesday announcing the closure, the company said the 100-year-old building would need “significant ongoing investment” to keep operating long-term.

“The decision to close any plant is one that we take very seriously,” Curtis Frank, president and CEO of Maple Leaf Foods, wrote in the release.

The location processes more than nine million kilograms of poultry products each year, employing around 150 workers, according to their website.

The closure will be felt by “all of Brantford and its surrounding areas,” Brantford Coun. Michael Sullivan wrote in a Facebook post Wednesday evening.

He expressed concern about the impact it would have on the community, “and the employees and their families whose lives are dependent on Maple Leaf Foods.”

Sullivan wrote he was told the building — originally built in 1899 and rebuilt following a fire in the early 1940s — “can’t be upgraded to meet today’s operating standards.”

He went on to say executives at Maple Leaf Foods told him they’re “working to relocate as many employees as possible” to nearby Maple Leaf plants.

Celeste Percy-Beauregard’s reporting is funded by the Canadian government through its Local Journalism Initiative. The funding allows her to report on stories about Brant County. Reach her at cpercybeauregard@torstar.ca.

Celeste Percy-Beauregard, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter, The Hamilton Spectator

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