6/18/99:Ocean Spray chief Bullock to leave troubled cooperative By Chris Reidy, Globe Staff
''They were a monopoly for many years, now it's a competitive environment, and it's not an environment they're comfortable in.'' John Decas, President, Decas Cranberry Products HERE

Chris Reidy's Globe article was picked up by the Knight-Ridder/ Tribune Business News service serving 50+ Knight-Ridder owned newspapers (listed here).

6/18/99: Boston Globe - Associated Press announcement
"Despite the company's troubles, Ocean Spray reported sales of $1.48 billion for its last fiscal year ending Aug. 31, 3 percent more than the previous year. It also reported profits of $280 million, up from $273 million the previous year."
HERE

6/16/99: Ocean Spray growers can read the letter from Board Chairman Don Hatton in the Extra net HERE.

Tom Bullock Retires

6/16/99: Tom Bullock became President and CEO of Ocean Spray in early 1997 with the promise to "reinvent the company and the cooperative". In an interview in Harvest Magazine (Vol. 19 No.2 May 1997) he promised   "this is all about creating prosperity for grower/ owners. That's why we're in business: higher returns per unit, a more valuable enterprise that they can have access to, a guaranteed home for their fruit in the future and maintaining farming as a way of life for the next generation."

Here's Bullock on competition from the same article: "As category leaders we have to continue to lead from strength. It's like playing king of the mountain when you're a kid. The guy on top is the winner. He has the advantage of working from height.  We're king of the mountain in the juice-drink business. There are a lot of people who want to knock us off, though. If we weaken, they will bring us down."  There was no clarification as to which competition he was referring to, companies like Northland, Decas and Hiller who were fighting for a relatively small portion of the cranberry  market, or the giant juice-drink beverage companies.

As he began his tenure, Bullock's prediction for the year 2005 was that Ocean Spray would still stand for cranberry and grapefruit with the core consumers. However, his goal was expansion: "we have to get a younger audience, we have to go for a more male audience, we have to go for a larger consumer audience than we have right now, we have to be available in more places."

Until more information is released, readers may want to review the PricewaterhouseCoopers Web Site here to become familiar with a likely candidate for transition management, as it has world renown expertise in "defining and facilitating change strategies and organizational transformations". It also offers a Transaction Services which is "dedicated to assisting clients with mergers, acquisitions, divestitures, joint ventures, spinoffs and strategic alliances."

Another company, with close ties to Ocean Spray, that has much to offer is Fleishman-Hillard, a company that works "closely with top management of some of the largest corporations in diverse areas such as senior management positioning programs, crisis counseling, merger situations, labor disputes and issues management. Fleishman-Hillard professionals have experience in crisis recovery, corporate identity programs, mergers and acquisitions, and in effecting socioeconomic or legislative change."

McKinsey & Co. is yet another top drawer management consulting company that may be in the running when outside help is evaluated. They have a relevant article in their August 1997 online magazine (click here), "Corporations of the Future". It is well worth reading. Here's a quote:  "Large corporations convinced that size ensures success often struggle to translate size and scale into customer value and profits. A lot of our clients have been choking in their own complexity, resulting in little innovation or employee fulfillment-and they are looking to us for answers."

It remains to be seen what, if any, role the ubiquitous Andersen Consulting firm will have in Ocean Spray's future.

New readers interested in getting a sense of the dissatisfaction among Ocean Spray grower/ owners prior to Tom Bullock's retirement announcement, can read the two pages of over one hundred postings and responses in the Cranberry Stressline Forum. You can also look at the article that, along with the Fourm, began the transformation of a web site about farm stress to a news and opinion web site, here. Readership jumped from 130 a month to 1,300 in March and then increased to over 3,000 in April, when an Ocean Spray spokesman called it "odd and misguided" in a newspaper interview ("Web page ammunition for modern-day David", New Bedford Standard Times, 4/14/99.) The number of "hits" this month is already nearly 9,000.