Hershey Trust CEO says Hershey Co. not for sale

NEW YORK, Mar 18: The head of Hershey Trust Co., which holds a majority of voting shares in chocolate maker Hershey Co., on Friday said the company was not for sale, despite a media report that a new takeover bid could be in the offing.

''Our position is what it has been, which is the company is not for sale,'' Robert Vowler, president and chief executive of the trust, told Reuters. The trust controls 78 percent of the voting shares in Hershey Co. and 31 percent of the economic interest.

Business Week reported in its March 27 edition that a bid may surface for Hershey, citing Michael Metz of Oppenheimer, which owns Hershey shares. The bid might be ''difficult to resist,'' the magazine quoted Metz as saying.

A Hershey Co. spokeswoman could not be reached for comment on the report.

REUTERS