Frito-Lay, a subsidiary of PepsiCo, has shut down its manufacturing facility in Rancho Cucamonga, California, marking the end of a 50-year operation and affecting a significant number of employees. The closure, which does not include the site’s warehouse, distribution, fleet, or transportation operations, comes as PepsiCo undertakes broader cost-cutting and restructuring efforts across its North American snack division.

The company did not disclose the total number of layoffs, nor whether severance packages were provided. According to local media reports, many employees were terminated without offers to transfer to other positions within the organization.

In a statement to USA Today, PepsiCo acknowledged the impact of the shutdown: “We are truly grateful for all the support over the last five decades from our Rancho Cucamonga manufacturing team as well as the local community. We are committed to supporting those impacted through this transition and we are offering pay and benefits to impacted employees.”

This latest closure follows several similar moves across PepsiCo’s North American operations. In February 2025, nearly 300 positions were eliminated following the shutdown of a PepsiCo plant in Liberty, New York. Last month, Frito-Lay also shuttered a storage facility, resulting in 56 job losses.

The closures come against a backdrop of falling snack demand in the region. In its fourth-quarter earnings report for 2024, PepsiCo reported a 3% decline in Frito-Lay sales in North America. “In 2024, the salty and savory snack categories underperformed broader packaged food, following multiple years in which these categories had outperformed packaged food,” said CEO Ramon Laguarta and CFO Jamie Caulfield in a joint statement cited by CNBC.

Several structural factors appear to be contributing to this decline. Ongoing inflation has led consumers to cut back on non-essential items, while heightened awareness around health and nutrition has prompted a shift away from traditional packaged snacks. Additionally, new regulatory pressure from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, led by Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., is driving the food industry to eliminate artificial ingredients from their portfolios.

PepsiCo has responded by focusing investment on its “better-for-you” offerings, including its Simply snack range and high-protein lines under the Quaker brand. The company has signaled its intent to align production with evolving consumer preferences, which could include reallocating manufacturing capacity from legacy snack plants to facilities better suited to producing reformulated or health-focused products.

While the Rancho Cucamonga site will continue to support logistics functions, the discontinuation of snack production there reflects a broader recalibration in PepsiCo’s North American strategy as the company looks to adapt to market volatility and shifting consumption trends.