Page 12/The Battalion/Wednesday, October 3, 1984
MATTRESS SET
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*
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•New Ribbons
•Reshaping
Fanny Farmer
uses gimmicks,
changes views
Japan: Seniority plan
is rapidly decaying
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GUILDERLAND, N.Y. — A
French confectioner is using gim
micks and exotic delicacies coupled
with a change in consumer attitudes
to turn 65-year-old Fanny Farmer
into a major force among U.S.
sweets companies.
Fanny Farmer Candy Shops Inc.,
currently worth $55 million, has de
veloped an aggressive sales and
image campaign under the new
ownership of Poulain S. A. of Paris, a
major baking company.
Poulain hired William Jorgenson,
formerly of Terson Co. Inc., to re
store Fanny Farmer’s reputation.
While at Terson, Jorgenson was re
sponsible for the Oh Henry! and
Raisinets candy lines.
“We have to return the product to
the superior standard it used to en
joy, and give people more value for
their money,” Jorgenson said in an
interview during a recent store
opening in Guilderland. Quality of
merchandise and service, including
gift-wrapping in company-owned
stores, are also part of Jorgenson’s
success formula.
Fanny Farmer has changed its
product, replacing sugar with milk
chocolate to improve the taste, Jor
genson said. Health concerns about
chocolate have disappeared because
of the countless warnings about po
tential health dangers from various
types of food.
The company also has pulled its
brand name boxes out of drug stores
and other retail locations it doesn’t
own in an effort to enhance its image
for quality.
Soon, truffles — named after the
French delicacies unearthed by hogs
— will be added to the product line
in an appeal to the upper income
consumers who indulge themselves
with chocolate and candy, he said.
Jorgenson said the company is re
sorting to some basic sales gimmicks
to boost sales, such as a drastic cut in
opening-day prices to lure shoppers
to new stores, and direct-mail adver
tising to coincide with the three big
candy-giving holidays, Valentine’s
Day, Easter and Christmas. Fanny
Farmer sells 55 percent of its prod
ucts for those three holidays, he said.
The changes come at a time of
slow growth in the confection indus
try.
Americans bought 4 billion
pounds of candy in 1983, up from
3.797 billion pounds the previous
year, the U.S. Department of Com
merce said. Chocolate accounted for
more than half the candy bought in
1983.
A two-year rebuilding campaign
will close 60 of 325 existing stores
while opening 100 in other cities,
Jorgenson said.
Regions such as Cincinnati, where
the company has just two stores, will
lose Fanny Farmer products, while
areas such as upstate New York,
New England and Florida will see an
influx of new shops.
“We’ll open wherever the traffic is
good,” Jorgenson said.
TOKYO — The swift pace of in
dustrial growth in Japan made the
nation’s management system a
model praised the world over, but
critics say the global recession has
highlighted its flaws.
A stifling seniority system has
thrust an army of paper pushers into
positions of authority and alienated
a growing number of talented junior
managers.
Some critics point to the
movement of promising young exec
utives to less rigidly structured
American and European companies.
Others predict the gradual ero
sion of the seniority system and cite
the practice of acquiring executive
personnel in a nation where mid-ca
reer job changes were nearly un
heard of 10 years ago.
Still others note the growing num
ber of middle managers promoted
beyond their skills and incapacitated
by fear of work, depression and alco
holism.
“As soon as you create a seniority
system you’re going to have people
who move to positions that are be
yond their capacity to fulfill,” said
Jon Woronoff, author of “Japan’s
Wasted Workers.”
“There’s going to be a lot of dead
wood ... and younger workers are
going to be frustrated. There’s very
little you can do about it. They made
a pledge to these people when they
were in their 20s. If they were good
boys, they would rise to the top.”
The system was well suited to a
fast-growing economy with a young
work force, but at the present time
it’s turned out to be the most dumb
system anyone could have adopted,
he said.
Critics like Woronoff say the trou
ble began with the slack growth peri-
ts of T
1970s. It created a deadlock of mid
dle and upper level executives hired
in the glory days of the 1960s when
economic growth surpassed 10 per-
ally.
cent annually.
With growth now around 4 per
cent, many Japanese companies find
themselves with so many senior
managers with too little to do that
they’ve created a name for them —
windowgazers.
A recent Labor Ministry survey
showed that 57.6 percent of the na
tion’s businesses had employees in
that category, a figure that is likely to
rise as the rapidly aging population
pushes for an increase in the tradi
tional retirement age of 55.
Japanese labor law compounds
the problem by stipulating that em
ployees laid off before that age l>e
compensated with severance pay
higher than usually is paid in the
United States. “The seniority system
is one of the least efficient factors in
Japanese organizations,” said Mo-
moru Nakamura, a vice president in
charge of investment banking in
Merrill Lynch’s Tokyo office.
Junior executives with American
MBAs are the easiest targets for the
new breed of headhunters setting up
shop in Tokyo, but they are not the
only ones. Seasoned executives who
find themselves pushed into “win
dowgazing” jobs or forced to retire
at 55 also are lending their talents to
overseas competitors.
Nakamura said the differences
ods following the oil shocks of the
between U.S. and Japanese manage
ment are hard to handle at first.
Japanese firms have found the
trend can work to their advantage.
Some have taken the unusual step of
commissioning headhunters to lure
unwanted senior employees away to
other firms — a kind of outplace
ment service that makes room for
more talented middle managers.
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THE
RIG
SMITH
STORY
Last Spring, Bill Prej c
our former Stai
Representative re%
from office in order to
to work for Texas As
This allowed Gov.
White (Dem.) to
Special Election tofiUj;
vacancy. Would
believe he set
election duringAflu
Spring Break? He
Why? To keep theA|
from voting. He knew*
could make a differenjj
There are only 45,t
registered voters
Brazos County (wliit
alone makes upti;
State Representatl
District.) Therea:
37,000 students at Al
s o obviously Ifw
register to vote and
we can make
difference. As it
out, many Aggiesdii
register to vote andvt
absentee for
Richard Smith ’59. He
the only experience:
conservative
independent candidi
who can go to Aual
and get the job done.
Richard Smith AS’Miii;
Just a part of the disti
A<S?M is a commii
THIS MONTH’S REQUIRED
READING LIST:
BUSINESS ETHICS 201
Howard Hughes’ secret plan to
“t>uy” the U.S. government.
SOCIOLOGY 205
Veterans (and casualties) of
the sexual revolution.
Ell
POLITICAL SCIENCE 304
Interview with Salvadoran
President dose Duarte.
PHYSICAL ED 409
The crazy world of college
football by Dan <Jenkins.
MUSIC APPRECIATION 307
The 1985 Playboy Music Poll.
FILM APPRECIATION 204
A review of Sex in Cinema.
FASHION <5? CULTURE 108
Christie Brinkley in clothes of the
times; plus punk hair styles.
ANATOMY 400
PTovember Playmate Roberta Vasquez.
NOVEMBER PLAYBOY:
Must reading for students who take their studies very seriously
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and a concern that
Aggies share. It ended
that over 13,000 p
voted last March,
candidate, Rlchar;
Smith, lost by 29
(to force a runoff),
two tenths of one pe:
of all the votes cast
March our candidate
The conservativi
Republican lost to
White’s chosea
Democrat, Neeley Lem
That was the Specii
Election.
The Battalion Editorial!
Board c ailed ttf
scheduling of the Special
Election by Us
Democrats “an attack £
Texas AG?M students,
s taff and facultj
members.” The StudeaB
Senate passed a
resolution in oppositiE
to the setting ofth:!
election date whea
Aggies could not vote
Governor White (Dem!
refused to even see to
student governmen
leaders concerning
issue. The Biyan-Col
Station Eagle Editoria.
Board said, “Let’s face
this whole thing smack
of partisan politics
most p etty lei
“...Democrat Party officiu
had described March H
as a ‘convenient day 1 foi
the election.” Convent
to keep the Aggies frok
voting. Convenient®
the Democrats to unfair!;
help Neeley Lewis.
On Nov. 6, we have
chance to prove that ft
won’t be pushed arouti
again. Richard
and Neeley Lewis are on
the ballot again--
time in a fair fight. W
will determine
winner, if we register t
vote (the deadline is
6) and then vote onl
6. Mark White and ®
Democrats can’t set to 5
election when theAgg®
can’t vote. It’s up tons!
Se
MORAL:
TOGETHER W2
CAN MAKE A
DIFFERENCE
Th
ney i:
worn*
Fight
Th
Nelki
Melai
crimi
Texa:
tleme
the s
Howe
attly
Hi
ft
J If you want to W
jf make a difference,
£ join Aggie GOP or
AT NEWSSTANDS NOW.
J call the Smith
jf headquarters at
1984, Playboy
J 846-0047.
jf. Political ad Paid For by
jF The Richard Smith Campaign
W.<
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