Spitz done in southern Alberta

Sunflower seed brand’s parent company wants production moved closer to the crop supply, which has dwindled heavily in the region

The sun will set on Spitz — the southern Alberta success story that grew into a nationally known sunflower seed snack, and as a business in Bow Island was bought out by a global snackfood giant 10 years ago.

On Thursday, owner PepsiCo informed more than 50 employees at the Bow Island processing plant it would close later this year with production moved closer to crop supply in the United States.

“This was a business decision based on an extensive evaluation of the long-term viability of this site and its ability to meet our increasing volume requirements for the brand,” read a statement from a FritoLay spokesman on Friday.

“(Spitz) will continue to play an important role in our North American portfolio. We are committed to assisting our impacted associates with financial support, access to financial counselling and job placement services."

The News has learned 53 employees will be affected by the closure and layoffs.

Two years ago, PepsiCo ended its lease on its distribution centre in southwest Medicine Hat and amalgamated those operations into its Bow Island location.

Spitz was begun in 1982 by couple Tom and Emmy Droog, who built up the Alberta Sunflower Company into a renowned brand and the seed of choice for baseball players and others through their numerous local sponsorships.

In 2008, after the “Spitz” brand went national, PepsiCo sought out the Droogs to make a deal and the business was sold for an undisclosed sum, with Tom Droog stating at that time it was the best choice to grow the company.

Ten years later, local business and political interests said the closure would be felt throughout the county.

“For Grassy Lake, Burdett, Bow Island and the county, that’s a lot of jobs and families effected,” said County of Forty Mile Reeve Steve Wikkirink .

“Hopefully we can find somebody to go back in and use that facility for a different purpose. But for now that’s a pretty big blow for our area.”

MLA Drew Barnes said the announcement was “devastating” and squarely blamed the current New Democratic government for increasing costs when the United States federal government is reducing taxes.

“More and more Alberta businesses are going to be voting with their feet and moving,” he said.

The decision surprised Will Van Roessel of Bow Island’s Specialty Seeds.

“They’re the dominant employer in the sunflower market in Western Canada,” Van Roessel told the News’s sister paper, the 40 Mile Commentator, on Friday.

“It’s not as if they were a small player losing market share, or anything like that. You can go to most stores in Western Canada and wouldn’t even find sunflowers by another brand.”

PepsiCo officials would not discuss its plans for where it would relocate production.

Local growers

It is not immediately known how the closure would affect local growers, but it seems as though sunflowers have fallen off as a cash crop of choice in the region.

Sources tell Southern Alberta Newspapers that most of the plant’s recent production was done with crops trucked in from Manitoba, where 90 per cent of Canada’s sunflower crop is grown.

According to the St. Mary’s Irrigation District’s 2016 Annual report, only 820 acres in the district was set aside for sunflower planting.

Across Canada, sunflower production fell to 50,000 acres in 2017, half the amount from just two years earlier.

The United States Department of Agriculture states that in 2017, South Dakota produced the largest sunflower crop with more than 600,000 acres planted in 2017. North Dakota follows with 420,000 acres. Those two states account for more than three-quarters of U.S. acreage.