MODESTO -- Foster Farms Dairy plans to close an ice cream factory in Salem, Ore., that it bought in 2010.
The Modesto-based company said planned upgrades at the plant, long known as Deluxe Ice Cream, proved too costly.
Layoffs of the 75 full-time and 25 seasonal employees will start about Oct. 1, according to a news release. They are invited to apply for openings at other Foster Farms sites, all of them in California.
The closure will leave Foster Farms with about 1,000 employees, spokesman John Segale said. Most of them are at the headquarters plant in Modesto.
The Salem plant has its roots in a dairy farm that was founded in 1913 and sold Salem Sanitary Milk. It evolved into a producer of novelty items such as ice cream sandwiches and drumsticks.
Foster Farms bought the plant and another in Sacramento from Matterhorn Group Inc., which is based in Boise, Idaho, and filed for bankruptcy protection.
Modernizing the Salem plant "would run in the millions of dollars," the news release said.
Foster Farms, founded in 1941 in Modesto by Max and Verda Foster, has become the largest privately owned dairy company in California.
In 2007, it bought Crystal Cream and Butter Co. of Sacramento, which led to the Crystal brand being placed on Foster Farms products.
A year later, Foster Farms bought Humboldt Creamery, a Eureka-area producer of organic and conventional dairy products.
The Foster Farms poultry operation, based in Livingston, is a separate company owned by the Foster family.
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