Food manufacturers across the U.S. have spent the past year cutting capacity, selling assets, and restructuring as debt costs and weak profitability continue to pressure the packaged-food business. In California, that trend landed hard in Stanislaus County when Del Monte Foods permanently shut its Modesto fruit processing plant and wiped out 765 jobs overnight. The closure ended operations at one of the Central Valley’s longest-running fruit canneries.
Del Monte made the closure official in early April
Del Monte Foods Corporation II Inc. permanently closed its Modesto plant at 4000 Yosemite Boulevard, Modesto, CA 95357, with 765 job cuts effective April 7, 2026, according to California WARN records filed with the Employment Development Department. The state listing identifies the action as a permanent closure, not a temporary layoff, and shows the notice tied to Stanislaus County’s largest single WARN event in that reporting period.
A separate notice sent January 30, 2026, to Stanislaus County officials said Del Monte was permanently closing the entire Modesto plant and that the first employment separations were expected on or about April 7, 2026. That county correspondence also said additional separations could occur later, meaning the April date marked the beginning of the shutdown’s employment impact rather than a single administrative milestone.
The same state WARN report shows Del Monte also listed a second Stanislaus County closure in Hughson at 2018 Santa Fe Avenue, Hughson, CA 95326, affecting 11 workers effective April 7, 2026. Together, those notices documented the end of Del Monte’s remaining local fruit-processing footprint as the bankruptcy process moved from restructuring to plant shutdown.
The shutdown hit Modesto and the wider Central Valley
What is confirmed is the location and scale of the largest layoff: 765 workers at the Modesto facility in Stanislaus County. County correspondence and California WARN data both identify Modesto by name and give the Yosemite Boulevard address, which makes this one of the clearest plant-closing cases in the state’s 2026 food-manufacturing sector…