Twinkies Presented At Wal-Mart Shops

Twinkies come back to Wal-Mart stores ahead of schedule. The retailer said that it will start selling the cakes at around 1,600 locations beginning Friday. The retailer added that around 3,000 of its 4,000 stores in the United States will carry the product by Sunday, which is a day before Hostess said the yellow cakes would be available on the market again.

By next week, Wal-Mart stores will have fried Fruit Pies and Muffins on their shelves. Ho Hos, Coffee Cakes, Suzy Qs, Orange Cupcakes, and Zingers will make their comeback by August. Sno-Balls will be available on the market in the fall.

The new owners of Hostess save announced that the company will be freezing Twinkies for around 10 percent of its retailers that allows the stores to stamp their own expiration dates on the spongy yellow cakes. Wal-Mart spokesperson Veronica Marshall said that Wal-Mart is not one of the retailers that requested frozen Twinkies.

Hostess said that Twinkies have a shelf life of 45 days. This is almost three weeks longer than the 26 days the previous owner of Twinkies had stated for the cakes. Hostess said that changes were made under the previous owners and the longer lasting version of the cakes got on the market just as the company filed for bankruptcy.

Hostess went out of business last year after years of experiencing management problems as well as a standoff with its second largest union. The company sold all of its brands. Twinkies and other Hostess cake brands were bought by private equity firms Apollo Global Management and Metroupoulos & Co. These companies are known for repairing brands then sell them for profit.

Marshall didn’t say how Hostess cake sales were performing at Wal-Mart branches before the company went bankrupt. The retailer also sells Little Debbie cakes that are made by McKee Foods Corp and Tastykake that is made by Flowers Food.