Yarnell's out of business???

[Ginger Doll]

Yarnell's is out of business??? Someone please, say it isn't so!!!

That's so, so sad. Yarnell's made the very best ice cream ever, in my opinion. I'm going to miss their products. And it's also very sad for those that lost their jobs at Yarnell's.

http://arkansasmatters.com/fulltext/?nxd_id=438307

[Guest061415-1]

Yes, I'm afraid it's true. They closed the production line on June 30... no warning at all to the employees. The company has been experiencing a LOT of financial problems, higher raw materials cost (especially sugar) and unable to get credit. I had also heard that Blue Bell (among others) was selling under cost to Arkansas stores in order to push Yarnell's out.

(On the other hand, I've been told by a Yarnell's insider I know that the family didn't pay a lot of attention to cost overruns, paid themselves big salaries and spent the company into bankruptcy.)

Yarnell's bought a LOT of their milk locally, so there will be financial ripples throughout central Arkansas.

On Thursday afternoon I was at Purple Cow on Cantrell... PCow is 100% Yarnell's products... and overheard the restaurant manager talking to the owners about his supply of purple vanilla. Lots of noise, but I heard him say "5 days" followed by "Blue Bell".

It sucks. Nobody's vanilla was as good as "Homestyle Vanilla"... almost as good as my mother's homemade recipe. The closest was Baskin Robbin's French Vanilla, but it's been discontinued. I guess I'll have to just make my own more often.

[Commander Salamander]

Though it's more expensive, you might try some of the organic varieties at places like Kroger (in the natural foods section) or Whole Foods. I don't recall which brand, but I remember one of them as being the best vanilla ice cream I've ever had.

[Guest061415-1]

Forgot to add, Yarnell's actually made other companies' products... Dove bars were one if I remember right... so you may see some changes in the store brands in the near future.

[guest071811-3]

yarnells use to buy locally their milk products but considering one of the largest producers of milk got bought out years ago..coleman dairy was the only one left really as a major producer.. and even they outsourced much of their product.. considering that the dairy industry mostly sold out especially their land to get those nice "gas wells" put in.. the dairy industry fell from something like a few thousands dairies to prolly less than a hundred in the state that is mass producing milk..

this went on some 14yrs ago.. yarnells has probably be outsourcing the milk they recieved for years now.. leading to higher cost as well..

that and if ya'll seen how the milk was handled (milk sent to the ice creams plants was mostly scrap milk, milk with to much cream in it or to much anti bodies)..flies swarming in the open vats.. i mean don't get me wrong.health cards are required..but ya..no pleasant lol


sorry for the story..family member is a retired bulk milk hauler dating back to the old borden factory on asher and dating even further back to the orginal campa group that picked up milk and sold to most major places and bottled it

[Ginger Doll]

Why is it that as soon as you know you can't have something, you've never wanted it so badly? This is my favorite:



Supposedly, people are running around buying up Yarnell's like crazy...and they're out of it mostly everywhere you go.

[Guest061415-1]

I hear you, DeAnna... my contact said that Yarnell's still tried to buy as much as possible from within the state, and paid higher than normal prices for it. But like you said, the big producers traded pasture for gas wells. And now it looks like the gas wells may not be as profitable as originally predicted.

Like your family friend, I remember the Bordens and the Coleman plants on Asher. (I also remember the Asher Drive-In... both before it went XXX and after...) I remember Casa Bonita, Cinema 150 and a fantastic used book store. Kroger Grocery (where I snuck a peek at my first Playboy! Hormones, meet boobies!!! ) was next door to Radio Shack. Shusters Furniture. K-Mart (and the smell of popcorn as you entered the store.)

But then the employers left the area. The UALR area certainly nosedived after the daily companies left, but maybe the revitalization project will take hold and bring it back.

What the hell happened to community businesses? My father worked for the same company for 38 years then retired. The company I work for has been sold 5 times in 20 years, with upper management raiding it to line their pockets just before selling to a new set of vultures.

Sigh... damn, I'm old...

[shorty]

Ginger. . . Guess we'll have to make our own Strawberry Shortcake.

[guest071811-3]

Originally Posted by Slingerland

I hear you, DeAnna... my contact said that Yarnell's still tried to buy as much as possible from within the state, and paid higher than normal prices for it. But like you said, the big producers traded pasture for gas wells. And now it looks like the gas wells may not be as profitable as originally predicted.

Like your family friend, I remember the Bordens and the Coleman plants on Asher. (I also remember the Asher Drive-In... both before it went XXX and after...) I remember Casa Bonita, Cinema 150 and a fantastic used book store. Kroger Grocery (where I snuck a peek at my first Playboy! Hormones, meet boobies!!! ) was next door to Radio Shack. Shusters Furniture. K-Mart (and the smell of popcorn as you entered the store.)

But then the employers left the area. The UALR area certainly nosedived after the daily companies left, but maybe the revitalization project will take hold and bring it back.

What the hell happened to community businesses? My father worked for the same company for 38 years then retired. The company I work for has been sold 5 times in 20 years, with upper management raiding it to line their pockets just before selling to a new set of vultures.

Sigh... damn, I'm old...

LOL.. ya I am not that old..but as a kid i remember going over to meet him and kroger being there etc.. he slept many a night down the road there at bordens.. slept many a night over off 65th where the main "campa" headquarters was at the time..then became ampi in the 70's i believe and moved to colonel glenn and the plant is now a landscape comapny down where shackleford and colonel glenn intersect.. he dropped his bulk milk at bordens..then got moved to Gold Star Dairies over off 30 near scott hamilton which is not COLEMANS lol.. he then moved to colemans dropping his load over off asher. we ate many a good dinner at casa bonita lol (his favorite place)..that whole area was where you went to shop..kmart like you said.. hell down the road was major malls (who don't remember montgomery wards..u was high class there) lol..

your right that whole area went to hell quick.. the lot that is now coleman apartments was where my family members truck stayed park..they would turn it on in the winter and let it idle so it would be warm when he got there sometimes 2hrs later lol.. they stopped that when they found someone climbing in it!! lmao..thats when they put up fences etc..

its funny..if yarnells refused the "bad load" they would just run the trailers down there and dump some 80,000 gallons of raw milk on the ground..cream plants didn't want it..yarnells didn't want it..so it was NO GOOD..thats also what got colemans in trouble with the feds and investigated and some top ampi execs spent some time in federal pen for violations lol

thats another story..

slingerland --its kinda cool to find someone that remembers that area lol..i spent much of my childhood in that area picking up said family member and waiting etc...even after i got up older my SO and I go meet him for dinner

the force retired all the senior drivers (he had 35 years with them straight and was second only behind a driver with 6 more months than him)..retired at 64..then sold out to contract companies out of state..the dairymen got robbed.. sold land to gas wells..and like you said..are making prolly more money with less hassles doing it like this..he still gets his "dairymens digest" publication for the 'biz".. he kept up with alot of the major dairymen that sold out immediately or eventually.. often times to as the "old timers" passed away they left it to kids that could care less about the family dairy business and sold it off for profit.. my family member was the only one allowed to pick up the dairy men on wolverton mountain near centerridge..he knew everyone up there and when he got that route assigned to him even his relief driver had to run the alternate route those days and not pick them up lol..oddly most of them sold out or passed away and thus the downfall

kinda sad..and now yarnells down the drain

[Guest032112]

Slingerland and DeAnna, I remember all those places too. (and yes, one of the CAMPA execs that "took the fall" was the father of a good friend of mine and I knew him well) From a biz perspective, I hate to see any company that's been around for as many years as Yarnells shut down.

No one's picked up on it, but one of the news reports I saw had video running and there was a locksmith truck and a mention of locks being changed. Makes me wonder if the friendly, helpful people at the IRS had anything to do with the decision to shut down since there some attempts at obtaining financing. There may have been alternatives except that . . .

[Sweet N Little]

this and strawberry were my fav's



Slingerland, Awww the memories!! Casa Bonita , I remember I thought it was so cool raising those flags at your table and they bring you more sopapillas with honey and fried ice cream for desert

[guest071811-3]

Thats an excellent point..i haven't looked that close at the news reports..just read a few things here and there.. your right..anytime a local company shuts down like that it sucks.. however often times it is hard to feel to sorry if it comes down to greed, mismanagement and stuff like that..if it truly is simply a sign of the times and expense of materials coupled with wages etc and lack of sales..then thats sad..

[TechOne]

from the fly on the wall...the plant 'may' be opened up again, by the recent production employees, under 'better' management, new financing, and fewer SKUs...

the stumbling block is milk supply...east Texas drought has been the hardest blow on the cattle farmers and dairys...no water to keep the animals...Arkansas dairymen are getting to be fewer and fewer with no change in sight. Milk costs have been climbing the last 6 years, but Yarnell's really should have re-organized 10 years ago. CPA firms have been fired for even mentioning that to the 'family'.

[MacTheKnife]

Originally Posted by Slingerland

...I remember Cinema 150

The rocking chairs.

[shorty]

I liked the drive-in movie theater next to the Coleman Dairy Plant. What fond memories of steaming up the car windows. Never did catch what the movie was about, though!! To busy watching those tities bounce and hitting me in the face.