Laid off from Saputo.

What Saputo layoffs have meant for employees

Fond du Lac, Belmont, Lancaster and Green Bay each had a named plant waiting to take the work, which tells you where production went and not whether a job went with it. Fond du Lac's production was headed to a new blue cheese plant in Almena, the November 2017 release said, and The Canadian Press had Lancaster's and Belmont's going to Reedsburg. Green Bay's packaging was bound for Franklin, a site Dairy Business tied to more than 650 jobs in southeastern Wisconsin, and South Gate's string cheese work was to go to Tulare in the plan Just Food reported. In Canada in 2020, Saint John's and Trenton's production was to move to other Saputo plants, according to Huddle Today. If you're offered a place at a receiving plant and severance is the alternative, the cost of getting there, a longer drive or a house move, belongs in the comparison.

Green Bay is the closing to study if your plant has been named, because its date moved after the terms went out. The letter to Wisconsin says staff learned of retention and severance pay the day the closing was announced and got the details in the weeks after, each employee with HR leadership. It also describes employees as being compensated above and beyond their standard or hourly pay rates. A later closing can change what a retention deal is worth, since it can mean more weeks of work to earn it or a longer wait for it, depending on how the terms were written. If retention pay is part of your terms, it's worth having in writing whether it pays on a set date or on the plant's last day, and whether leaving before a moved date costs you the money.

A state notice wasn't the first warning at these plants. Belmont's closing had been announced before its notice went in, the Lancaster notice in our tracker followed its November 2023 announcement by about three months, and the Green Bay letter came 31 months after that plant's closing was announced. At Green Bay and Lancaster, severance or transfer terms surfaced with the announcement, well before any letter reached the state. If you're waiting for a notice before you plan, Saputo's own announcement has been the earlier signal in each of those cases. That lead time is the useful part of this record, because it's when a retention offer, a transfer and a job search all get weighed together.

Plants aren't the only place severance shows up. Saputo's August 2026 results tie the severance costs booked a year earlier to stopping certain dairy ingredients and to optimizing selling, general and administrative costs. That's a company total, so it can't stand in for what any one person received. A union put its own view on record in 2016, when DairyReporter quoted a Teamsters representative saying the company needed to offer a much better severance package at Ottawa. If a local represents your plant, its stewards may know more about closing terms than any release says.

When a future employer asks why you left, a plant closing Saputo announced itself is a plain answer, and explaining a layoff can help you put it in a sentence. The account of Green Bay on the February 2026 call was about scale and streamlined processes, with chief executive Carl Colizza crediting them for a roughly 30% rise in Franklin's output, as MarketBeat's summary of the call tells it. If you were at a Wisconsin plant, Wisconsin unemployment benefits lays out what a claim involves there, and California unemployment benefits does the same for South Gate.

A sourced history of Saputo layoffs

• September 2025, closing update for the Suamico plant

  A letter to Wisconsin put the Green Bay plant's end at December 2025, past the December 2024 date Saputo first announced. Our tracker lists 240 jobs, and Dairy Business reported phased layoffs planned for November and December at the Suamico site.

• January 2025, Kirkby Malzeard closing proposed in England

  Saputo Dairy UK planned to close the North Yorkshire creamery by July after staff consultation, moving production to Nuneaton, and a January 17, 2025 Dairy Business report put the jobs at risk at 80.

• November 2023, Belmont notice and Lancaster closing announced

  Saputo said it would close Lancaster, affecting about 100 employees, according to The Canadian Press. Our tracker lists 187 Belmont jobs in a November 9 notice effective two days later, and 98 Lancaster jobs in a February 2024 notice.

• 2023, Frome, England, closing decided

  Saputo decided to shut its Somerset plant, with 170 job losses, according to Dairy Business.

• February 2023, three US closings and a move to Franklin

  On February 2, 2023, the date its 2025 letter gives, Saputo announced closings in South Dakota, Green Bay and South Gate, California. They would mean job losses for approximately 720 employees, it told Just Food. Staff could relocate or take severance. Packaging was to go to Franklin, Wisconsin, and South Gate's work to Tulare, California.

• February 2020, Saint John and Trenton closings in Canada

  Saputo said it would close Saint John, New Brunswick, and Trenton, Ontario, with around 280 employees affected, 199 of them in Saint John, according to a February 6, 2020 Huddle Today report. They were to get severance support, and some were to be offered jobs at other Saputo sites in Canada.

• November 2017, Fond du Lac, Wisconsin, closing announced

  Saputo scheduled the closing for May 2018, with approximately 126 employees impacted, its November 9, 2017 release said, adding that they'd get severance and outplacement support.

• March 2016, three plants in eastern Canada

  Some 230 jobs were to go in Ottawa, Sydney, Nova Scotia, and Princeville, Quebec, according to a March 23, 2016 DairyReporter report, with transfers offered to some employees.

• 2014, four closings in Wisconsin, Maryland and Alberta

  Saputo announced closures at New London, Wisconsin, Hancock, Maryland, and Wetaskiwin and Glenwood, Alberta, according to DairyReporter. Our tracker lists 60 Hancock jobs in a March 2014 notice.

What to do if you're laid off from Saputo

• File for unemployment in the state where you worked. Benefits run from your filing date, and severance usually doesn't block you. Saputo's biggest hubs: Wisconsin, California. Somewhere else? Every state is here.
• Apply for financial and hardship assistance. Unemployment supplements income, but food benefits, health coverage and utility help are often available as well. Here's some of what Saputo's hub states run: Wisconsin, California, and every other state is here.
• Mind the health insurance window. Losing coverage opens a 60-day special enrollment period, and an ACA plan usually beats unsubsidized COBRA. Compare your options before the employer coverage lapses, and read how the COBRA clocks run if you are weighing it seriously.
• Get your real runway number. Severance plus savings divided by reality. The calculator takes five minutes.
• Know which clocks are already running. Severance review windows, COBRA election, visa grace periods, and 401(k) rollovers all run on federal deadlines that started at termination. All five deadlines are here.