Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (WMT) and Kroger Co. (KR) are among the bidders for assets being sold by Hostess Brands Inc., the bankrupt maker of Wonder bread and Twinkies, said a person familiar with the matter. 
 
 There are about two dozen bidders, said the person, who asked not to be named because the process is confidential. Last month, financial adviser Joshua Scherer of Perella Weinberg Partners LP said the liquidation sale may generate about $1 billion. 
 
 A few of the bids are for all the assets, some are for just the cakes or breads businesses, and others are interested in individual Hostess plants or products, according to the person. Other first-round bidders include Grupo Bimbo SAB and Alpha Baking Co., the person said. 
 
 The 82-year-old maker of Hostess CupCakes, Ding Dongs and Ho Hos said last month that it would liquidate and fire more than 18,000 workers after failing to reach agreement with its striking bakers’ union on concessions to help it emerge from its second bankruptcy. Changes in American diets led to years of declining sales at Hostess, while ingredient costs and labor expenses climbed. 
 
 Representatives for Hostess, Wal-Mart, Kroger, Alpha Baking and Bimbo declined to comment on the auction process. C. Dean Metropoulos & Co., the private-equity firm that owns Pabst Brewing Co., planned to submit a bid, Daren Metropoulos, a principal at the Greenwich, Connecticut-based firm, said this week. He didn’t respond to a request for comment. 
 
 Photographer: Daniel Acker/Bloomberg Hostess Brands Inc. Twinkies snacks sit on a shelf inside the company's outlet store in Peoria, Illinois, on Friday, Nov. 16, 2012. Close Hostess Brands Inc. Twinkies snacks sit on a shelf inside the company's outlet store in... Read More Close Open Photographer: Daniel Acker/Bloomberg Hostess Brands Inc. Twinkies snacks sit on a shelf inside the company's outlet store in Peoria, Illinois, on Friday, Nov. 16, 2012. 
 
 Union Standoff 
 
 A standoff with striking union workers triggered liquidation auctions of Hostess’s brands, recipes, plants and other assets. The Bakery Confectionery Tobacco Workers and Grain Millers International Union went on strike Nov. 9 after U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Robert Drain imposed contract concessions opposed by more than 90 percent of the union’s members. The union represents more than 5,000 Hostess workers. 
 
 Hostess emerged from an earlier bankruptcy in 2009 as a private company controlled by buyout firm Ripplewood Holdings LLC and lenders. The company was previously known as Interstate Bakeries Corp. and changed its name to Hostess Brands in October of that year. Hostess entered its latest bankruptcy in January. 
 
 The new case is In re Hostess Brands Inc., 12-22052, U.S. Bankruptcy Court, Southern District of New York (White Plains). The prior bankruptcy was In re Interstate Bakeries Corp., 04- 45814, U.S. Bankruptcy Court, Western District of Missouri (Kansas City). 
 
 To contact the reporters on this story: Jeffrey McCracken in New York at jmccracken3@bloomberg.net; Beth Jinks in New York at bjinks1@bloomberg.net 
 
 To contact the editor responsible for this story: Jeffrey McCracken at jmccracken3@bloomberg.net ||||| Walmart is looking to lasso Twinkie the Kid. 
 
 The largest US discounter and other gigantic retail chains are among a pack of emerging bidders for some of the much-loved brand names to be auctioned off by bankrupt baker Hostess Brands, according to a report yesterday. 
 
 The maker of Wonder Bread, Twinkies and Ding Dongs — which last month closed its plants and laid off most of its 18,000 workers — has attracted a bevy of would-be breadwinners betting that America’s love affair with junk food isn’t over yet. 
 
 Walmart had been Hostess’s biggest customer, accounting for 40 percent of the baker’s production of Ho Hos, Suzy-Qs, Fruit Pies and Sno-Balls, among other sugary snack cakes. 
 
 If Walmart wins the Bankruptcy Court auction for the Twinkies brand — or any other Hostess asset — it could mean that the snack foods would be available in the US only in the 4,479 Walmart and Sam’s Club stores. 
 
 Walmart over the years has acquired numerous defunct labels, such as White Cloud toilet paper, which it snatched up after Procter & Gamble failed to renew its trademark. 
 
 Walmart declined comment. 
 
 Hostess, liquidating after management and unions failed to reach a labor deal with its bakers union, has received interest from about two dozen bidders in the first round of a bankruptcy auction, according to Bloomberg News, which cited unnamed sources and first reported on the Walmart bid. 
 
 Also ogling Hostess brands is grocery store giant Kroger, which has 3,226 groceries and convenience stores in the US. 
 
 “A few of the bids are for all the assets, some are for just the cakes or breads businesses, and others are interested in individual Hostess plants or products,” according to the report. 
 
 The report said other bidders include Mexican baking giant Grupo Bimbo as well as Alpha Bakers. 
 
 While a shift toward healthier eating habits among consumers helped push Hostess into insolvency, the cake maker was also scrambling to recover from years of mismanagement. 
 
 Hostess entered its latest bankruptcy in January, despite the fact it had emerged from a previous bankruptcy in 2009 under the ownership of buyout firm Ripplewood Holdings. 
 
 Now, Walmart is in the hunt for Hostess despite the fact that the mega-discounter earlier this month had weighed abruptly replacing the brand in order to avoid empty shelves, sources told The Post earlier this month.
– Sorry, Twinkies fans: Hostess really is shutting its doors. The company threatened to do so yesterday if striking workers did not return by the end of the day. Apparently they didn't, because CNN reports that the Twinkies maker is now asking a federal bankruptcy court for permission to go out of business. That will mean 18,500 employees will lose their jobs, but CNN notes that Ding Dongs and other popular items could still survive under another brand, as Hostess will be selling its assets at auction. Slate reminds us that Hostess has gone bankrupt before; that time around, Mexico's Bimbo Bakeries tried to nab it. Maybe they'll try again—although, writes Matthew Yglesias, "the company's various packaged snack cakes are cultural icons, but also pretty unfashionable in the era of artisanal cupcakes." Wonder Bread, too, has suffered as customers gravitate toward healthier options like multigrain bread. (Click to see why one food writer fervently believes it's time for the Twinkie to die.)