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Of: TT
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1 of 7 | Photo: Henrik Montgomery / TT
A beam rises like a cross over rubble and sacks of bread left from the fire at Polarbröd’s bakery in Älvsbyn.
Älvsbyn breathes Polarbröd. But now the city’s biggest employer is in ashes and the bakery will take years to rebuild.
– Yes, how do you handle that gap? I have no idea, says the president of the Polarbröd club, Stefan Hortlund.
It smells like burnt plastic on the steel rock, plastic and debris left over from what before the August 23 fire was Älvsbyn’s largest employer.
Fire-damaged bags of polar cakes remain on the ground and a cross-shaped beam towers over the devastation and makes the fire tragedy almost obvious.
– There should be no bread left but those who are there have managed. That’s what I thought when I saw the bags, says club president Stefan Hortlund in Polarbröd.
Negotiations, talks, meetings with the prime minister and staff meetings have been going on since the fire. You have less than half an hour before the next meeting, he says.
– It is important that we think about the future. We must try to overcome this. This is not something we have experienced before.
Spirit of advancement, getting up and getting Älvsbyn to face this has been like the mantra after the fire: from the municipality, the company and the employees. The bakery will be built, but it will take years.
– Yes, how do you handle that gap? I have no idea, says Stefan Hortlund.
“Expected and shocking”
The day after the meeting at the bakery, Polarbröd sends out a press release: 131 more people are notified, in addition to the 58 substitutes who have already been able to leave.
Almost 200 jobs, in a municipality with just under 5,000 inhabitants, have literally disappeared.
Linda Eriksson, who worked at the feeders and made dough and baked bread, got a summer job in Polarbröd when she was 17 years old. That was 26 years ago.
TT contacts her a few hours after she was notified and learned that she was out of work for the first time in her life.
– There are many of us who have been there for an incredibly long time, so it feels terrible.
– At the same time, you understand, it will not be possible to pay us for several years until the bakery is rebuilt, he says.
Homes without work
The polar bread has been a gateway to working life for many of the young people in the municipality. Håkan Öberg, a local editor for Piteå-Tidningen, also worked in the bakery before entering journalism. During the night of the fire, she tried to capture the process and report what happened through her mobile camera, a few meters from the fire.
He agrees with many others: the fire is a disaster for Älvsbyn and its inhabitants.
– I know several in which the two in the house lost their jobs, he tells TT, during a break from work.
– Everyone has a close friend, family member or several who work there.
Attack many more
Älvsbyn breathes Polarbröd. It’s not just bakery jobs that stay and fall in the factory, but it affects subcontractors, electricians, cleaners, and trucking companies. Stores and restaurants are concerned about reduced consumption when many people lose their jobs and according to the chairman of the city council, Tomas Egmark (S), hundreds more are affected in addition to the employees.
– In Stockholm, this would be equivalent to 32,000 jobs that disappeared overnight, he says.
The government has promised support. Additional training opportunities are being reviewed and the company is looking at how to increase sandwich production and expand the bakery capacity in Bredbyn. At the same time, the municipality hopes to establish a mine in the town of Laver, which Egmark says would provide employment, hope and faith in the future.
– We have to offer some kind of job or training while they build a new factory and that’s what we work for, he says.
“Big rings in the water”
But no matter how you look ahead and no matter how much cohesion there is among the bakery employees, the bitter truth remains: the city’s largest employer is in ashes and the bakery will take years to rebuild.
Even if people are educated they must have a job to go to, many young people have lost an obvious first job and Älvsbyn, as a municipality, will be hit hard, believes Linda Eriksson.
– It will make big rings in the water, she says.
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