Cranberry Stressline Archives
July 22 to Aug. 8, 2000
Playing soda-hardball Coke used exclusive marketing
agreements to eliminate competition and was found guilty of
anti-trust violations in Texas lawsuit
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8/5/00 How folks in Washington state handle the environmental enforcers 8/3/00 Latest S&P credit rating for Ocean Spray and other food companies 8/3/00 From the Middleboro Gazette Decas looks at selling 525 acres including 72 acres of bogs From 8/2/00 Wisconsin Rapids Daily Tribune Big surplus = Big Problem and Area growers wonder where to spread or dump berries 8/3/00 New York Times - Snapple flavors to be in new candies Ocean Spray at the GOP convention State to pay $100,000 for consultants to study Makepeace development proposal V.P. Gore's press release on government purchase of pears Dole to replace Ocean Spray for Pepsi 7/31/00 According to an article in the July 21st issue of Beverage Digest, Pepsi is Pepsi preparing to replace Ocean Spray single serves with new Dole juices and juice drinks. Tri Valley Growers announced that it has received final approval from the Bankruptcy Court for its debtor -in- possession financing. Press release |
USDA rules on Oregon proxy vote for Marketing Committee7/27/00 The USDA has informed the Cranberry Marketing Committee that the marketing order does not authorize proxy voting and that the unofficial ballots that were used in the nomination process are invalid. The CMC has been asked to hold new elections in a letter to David Farrimond dated July 24, 2000 from Ronald L Cioffi, Chief, Marketing Order Administration Brand, Fruit and Vegetable Program. The USDA intends "to provide the committee with guidance concerning the new nomination procedures." They also "request the committee to develop specific nomination procedures before the next full nomination cycle, and submit them to the Department of Agriculture for approval." The current member who holds the seat in contention, Dave Lucas (an officer with Northland Cranberries), is not running this year. Gary Jensen, a Cliffstar grower from Wisconsin and Rick Kress, who is Northland group president, corporate sales and operations, ran against each other for the seat. Jensen's alternate was Nodji VanWychen, another Cliffstar grower. Kress' alternate was George Gant, a popular independent grower in the Bandon area. At the time Oregon growers were asked to vote for the Kress/Gant slate they report that they didn't know they were voting for the Northland representative when there would be an alternative slate. Then they received a letter from Jensen asking for them to vote for him, and many decided to change their vote. A number of Bandon growers later reported they felt deceived in this process and didn't know that they had committed themselves to voting for a Kress/Gant slate; and asked the CMC to rescind their votes so they could cast them for Jensen and VanWychen. Note: The Cranberry Marketing Committee Amendment subcommittee is meeting again on Friday, July 28th at 9:30 A.M. at the Airport Comfort Inn in Warwick, R.I. Northland suspends quarterly dividends as stock drops 21% in one day to under $2.007/26/00 5PM Stock summary: Northland regained some of Tuesday's loss, closing at 3/16 (+11.54%) in very heavy trading of 434,600. 7/25/00 Stock summary:
Northland stock closed under $2.00 for the first time. The last trade of 1
5/8 was down -7/16 (-21.21%)
from the close of 2 1/16 on Monday. It dropped steadily through the
day until 2:30 PM when it was just shy of $1.53, then it rebounded
three times in 90 minutes to about $1.85 before the close of $1.62.
Trading was heavy at 198,000, about four times its average. According to a
press release issued Monday evening "Northland Cranberries, Inc. (Nasdaq:
CBRYA), announced today that, unless and until such time as it can
successfully conclude its exploration of strategic alternatives, its Board
of Directors has taken action to suspend its quarterly cash dividend of
$0.04 per Class A share and $0.03636 per Class B share. For some well-thought-out opinions and analysis of the Northland situation, read the CBRYA message board, particularly the posts from IYEL and tooldguy (especially numbers 1125, 1136, 1138). 7/22/00 Northland is short on cash - Wisconsin Daily Tribune (WDT) | 7/22/00 Juice bottler sues Northland - WDT | 7/22/00 Northland brand still has value - WDT | 7/22/00 Northland faced with increased debt, decrease sales - A.P. 7/23/00 The Wisconsin Rapids Daily Tribune interviewed U.S. Bancorp Piper Jaffray's George Dahlman who said "the business environment in the cranberry industry is very tough right now... the market has worsened and Northland is merely a reflection of the industry. This is nothing new. Northland has been looking at strategic alternatives for several months now. I'm sure Northland would still consider sale of the company. But it's unlikely someone will buy the entire thing. If you're playing the probability game, you wouldn't want to hold out for that." |
CMC subcommittee wrestles with rules
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Quote 7/25/00 "Adding to the woes of Southern farmers, the prices of their crops aren't rising to reflect the damage being done to their fields. Export demand is weak and farmers in most of the rest of the nation are on track to reap bumper, if not record, harvests this year. The prices of cotton, corn, soybeans, cranberries and tomatoes are depressed. Two of the region's staple crops are cotton and peanuts; the government heavily controls the price of peanuts." From an article in today's Wall Street Journal entitled "Drought in the south Is pushing farmers to the brink of quitting." New Jersey grower DeMarco embroiled in controversy7/25/00 According to an Associated Press article that appeared in the Camden Courier Post on Sunday (7/24/00), Ocean Spray grower and former board member Garfield DeMarco may "be off the hook" for violating state wetland laws in the New Jersey Pinelands. DeMarco began a 33 acre expansion of his bogs in 1998 which included 22 acres that were allegedly in protected wetlands. He did not seek a state permit; thus opening himself for fines up to $10,000 a day, or over $8 million to date. A newly created state permit that allows "after-the-fact" approval was enacted in April. DeMarco's application is being considered. Continued Cranberry crisis covered on MSNBC.com7/22/00 The local news section of the MSNBC.com website has a story on July 20th on its Oregon news section. Cranberry grower Charlie Ruddell was interview and said that the situation looks so grim for him that he was unsure if they will be able to stay afloat this year. Ocean Spray's western general manager Bob Sopko is quoted as saying “my job is to turn around our business on the West Coast, so I’m here to assure the growers that we have a plan and strategy in place to do that. And that is to win in the marketplace for them.” The article ends with the conclusion that "the most recent glut is attributed to Wisconsin farmers who turned in two successive years of extremely heavy harvests." Read article.
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Ocean Spray 7/25/00 There's a new ``castle of cranberries'' in Plymouth, Mass. The new Ocean Spray Cranberry World® is now open, attracting hundreds of visitors daily with its exhibits depicting cranberry cultivation, the healthfulness of this unique North American fruit and the people who grow it. Continued | Related: Stressline pictorial on Cranberry World 7/24/00 - New device helps cranberry growers with irrigation - Standard Times So you want to become a corporate director, in the Sunday New York Times Cranberries in the grocery freezer?7/24/00 In response to a question printed in yesterday's "write to Know" column in the Cape Cod Times asking why, with a surplus of cranberries, consumers couldn't buy frozen cranberries year round, Brian Gill of Ocean Spray said that the idea had been test marketed, stating that "the proposal never really worked. It's not that simple on paper, either. Special machinery would have to be acquired for freezing; there would have to be broker distribution, retailing, as well as supermarket slotting fees. A lot of different considerations enter the picture but, thus far, we've found the demand for frozen cranberries doesn't warrant the extra investment... Consumer demand was not as high as we hoped." He told the Cape Cod Times that Ocean Spray tries to urge consumers each fall to buy and extra bag to store in the freezer where the berries will keep up to a year. |