Sale of Anheuser-Busch, economy top Missouri business stories

ST. LOUIS -- Over the last decade or so, St. Louis has seen the loss of many major corporate headquarters to buyouts and mergers: McDonnell Douglas, TWA, May Department Stores Co., A.G. Edwards, Pulitzer Publishing.

But none stung as bad as this year. Budweiser is now in Belgian hands.

The $52 billion sale of iconic St. Louis brewer Anheuser-Busch Cos. Inc. to InBev SA highlighted what was an overall difficult year for business in Missouri. InBev agreed to make St. Louis its North American headquarters, but the merger has already taken a toll -- 1,400 Anheuser-Busch workers, about 1,000 of them in St. Louis, saw their jobs eliminated 2 1/2 weeks before Christmas.

The job cuts at Anheuser-Busch were part of an effort to streamline costs and eliminate duplication of post-merger jobs. The company said the job losses will help it save at least $1.5 billion a year by 2011 and cope with a "challenging economy."

Around the state, many firms are dealing with similar challenges.

Auto industry cuts

The state's unemployment rate reached 6.5 percent. In suburban St. Louis, Chrysler shut down one of its two plants, citing decreasing sales of minivans. The plant employed 3,000 people in 2007. Now, it employs about 100.

The auto industry cuts have rippled through suppliers and other businesses. Sen. Kit Bond, R-Mo., said 225,000 jobs in Missouri alone are connected to the auto industry.

Anheuser-Busch-InBev wasn't the only company cutting jobs in the weeks before Christmas. St. Louis-based Furniture Brands International Inc. said it would eliminate 1,400 jobs, or 15 percent of its work force. Another St. Louis company, electronics component maker Belden Inc., announced 1,800 job cuts worldwide, or 20 percent of its total, citing softening demand.

Jobs were being slashed at places where layoffs are infrequent. In January, H&R Block Inc. announced plans to eliminate more than 500 corporate positions, most of them at its headquarters in Kansas City. In October, the nation's largest car rental company, St. Louis-based Enterprise Rent-A-Car, laid off 200 workers, the first mass layoff ever for the 51-year-old company.

Other companies take hits

The sour economy and declining advertising revenue continued to haunt media companies. The Kansas City Star cut 120 jobs in June and 50 more in November. The St. Louis Post-Dispatch laid off 31 workers in March and 20 more in September. Layoffs also hit newspapers in Kansas City, Springfield and Joplin.

Small towns weren't immune. Tiny Clarksville in northeast Missouri, with fewer than 500 people, is taking a big hit with the loss of 180 jobs at the Holcim Inc. cement plant. In the Bootheel, Noranda Aluminum is cutting 228 jobs by early next year at its New Madrid plant. Clothing-maker Thorngate Ltd. cut 250 jobs in Cape Girardeau.

St. Louis-based Ameristar Casinos Inc., cut its nationwide work force by 4.5 percent, including casino workers in St. Charles and Kansas City.

Some better news

But there was good news for Missouri's 12 casinos. Revenue was up 9 percent overall in November compared to a year ago, despite the sluggish economy. And in November, voters passed Proposition A, ending the state's $500 loss limit. The measure also capped the number of new casinos allowed in the state and raised taxes on existing ones.

Other noteworthy business news in 2008:

• St. Louis-based Energizer Holdings Inc. marked the 20th year of its Energizer Bunny, and it just keeps going and going, with no plans to move away from the drum-pounding pink bunny cited by some surveys as among the nation's most recognizable advertising icons.
• Interstate Bakeries Corp. on Dec. 5 received bankruptcy court approval for its reorganization plan, clearing the Kansas City-based maker of Hostess Twinkies and Wonder Bread to exit bankruptcy after more than four years. Under the plan, a group of lenders and an investor will provide almost $600 million in new financing and the company will be taken private.

In August, Missouri Secretary of State Robin Carnahan announced a national $8.5 billion settlement with Wachovia Corp., that calls for the Charlotte, N.C.-based company to buy back auction-rate securities from investors. The settlement came about a month after securities regulators from Missouri and other states went to Wachovia's St. Louis offices and requested documents and records related to auction-rate securities. Wachovia uses St. Louis as headquarters for its securities division.

• Brazilian beef giant JBS S.A. announced in March it planned to buy National Beef Packing Co. of Kansas City for $560 million in stock and cash, creating what would be the nation's largest beef processor. National Beef is the nation's fourth-largest beef packer. The Justice Department filed suit to block the deal, saying the combination could push up costs for consumers and drive down prices paid to ranchers and feedlots. More than a dozen state attorneys general have joined the lawsuit.
• In July, Kansas City lost a potentially huge influx in new jobs when Canadian plane maker Bombardier Inc. decided to assemble its new C-series passenger jets at a plant to be built in suburban Montreal. The decision came despite Kansas City and state officials assembling an aggressive incentives package.
• Gasoline prices that peaked at just under $4 a gallon in mid-July dipped below $1.50 around most of Missouri by December, as the price of a barrel of oil dropped by two-thirds.