Change in consumer taste plucks poultry plant's jobs.

Too many people want to pick up hot chicks. After about 20 years selling refrigerated roasted chicken, Springdale, Ark.-based Tyson Foods Inc. will close its Wilkesboro roasting plant, idling 410 workers. Blame consumers' need for speed, spokesman Gary Mickelson says. "It's due to the decline in popularity for the product and the increased popularity of hot rotisserie chickens. It was a wonderful product, but the marketplace changed. You can now go into your retail deli and pick up a rotisserie chicken that's hot and ready to eat, rather than one that has to be heated up." Tyson still will have about 2,150 employees at two other plants in Wilkesboro, and laid-off workers can apply there or at its plants in Monroe and Sanford.

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