From the Ground Up - McCain Foods Limited

RIGHT: The Russia team
in 2006: (left to right)
Elena Pankova, Anna
Kolochinskaya, Pieter
Toxopeus, Irina Mokhnatkina,
Erik Haasken, Irina Tishkina,
Tatiana Vlasikhina, Georgiy
Sitnik, Ksenia Baranova,
Mikhail Aksenev, Oksana
Lopyreva-Belyaeva, Elena
Yulina, Dmitry Zavgorodniy,
Svetlana Pronchenko,
Nadia Timakova, Ekaterina
Gavrish, Eldar Aleskerov,
Viktoria Volkova, Olga Berkut,
Sergey Mysyakov, Irina
Kuznetsova, Natalia Baranova,
Natalia Kulaeva, Karina
Shirmazanyan, Alexander
Buyanov, Svetlana Sakina.
BELOW: Russian-language
packaging.
McCain almost had a french fry factory in Ukraine. It bought the plant when it
was under construction but never took possession of it because the Ukrainian seller
and the bank that financed the plant both went bankrupt in the wake of a severe devaluation
of the Ukrainian currency.
Russia and the other republics of the former Soviet Union are designated by
McCain as eastern Europe and are under the management of Nick Vermont, CEO
for Britain. The former central European satellite countries, such as Poland and
Hungary, are part of the territory of Jean Bernou, CEO for continental Europe. The
central European countries historically had close ties to western Europe, and most of
them had democratic and capitalist traditions before being forcibly attached to the
Soviet bloc after World War II. Russia and other former Soviet republics are a different
story: most of them were never democracies, and they lack the legal and institutional
framework necessary to facilitate new business ventures.
Vermont has an odd geographical assortment under his purview – Britain, eastern
Europe, and South Africa. Dale Morrison, president and ceo, McCain Foods Limited,
has told him he has one developed market (Britain), one developing market (South
Africa), and, in eastern Europe, one blank sheet. “Eastern Europe is a very exciting
place, and it has huge long-term potential. But, culturally, it is a very different place to
do business,” says Vermont. “And, legally, it is a very difficult place to do business.”
One Friday night in 1995, Jean Bernou, a forty-twoyear-old
executive in the French office of Mölnlycke,
a Swedish disposable hygiene products company, was
watching a documentary on French TV about a business
story in Canada – the dispute between Harrison
and Wallace McCain over the future management
of McCain Foods. To his amazement, he received a
phone call the following Monday from a recruiter, inviting
him to interview for a job as managing director
of Beaumarais, the French manufacturer of private-
label potato products owned by McCain Foods. Bernou
knew that the European division of McCain was under
the supervision of Harrison McCain, whom he had just seen on TV. “The program
featured a lot of interviews with Harrison,” Bernou says. “I had a really good image
of him.”
Normally, Harrison McCain would have interviewed Bernou, but Harrison was
ill. So Gilles Lessard of the European McCain office interviewed Bernou and hired
him. Shortly after that, Bernou received his first phone call from Harrison. “He often
repeated what he was saying. He said, ‘You are the managing director? I want to see
you, I want to see you. If I don’t like you, I won’t hire you.’”
Since Bernou had already been hired and was at work in the Beaumarais office, he
was taken aback. Then Harrison said, “People have told me you are a nice guy so I
don’t need to interview you. So you are hired.”
Bernou joined McCain because he was looking for a job with a lighter workload
than the one he had at Mölnlycke. He was assured that the McCain job would take
up less of his time. And it did – for one year. Then he got a call on his car phone. It
was Harrison. He said, “I have a job for you. I want you to take charge of McCain
Alimentaire.”
Since McCain Alimentaire is the company’s major enterprise in France, producing
McCain-branded products for the retail market and french fries for restaurants, running
it is a bigger job than running the private-label manufacturer, Beaumarais.
Bernou said, “No, thank you. I am very happy where I am. I don’t want that job.”
Harrison said, “Think about it, and I will call you back.”
“Okay, Harrison, I’ll think about it.”
“You can take your time to think about it.”
“Thank you, Harrison.”
96 From the Ground up
Across the chA nnel 97
TOP: McCain’s microwaveable
fries, launched in 2004,
garnered the Innovation
Oscar that same year,
awarded by one of France’s
leading retail trade
publications, LSA.
BOTTOM: Lucille Degrave,
vice-president of marketing
for continental Europe,
says the French consumer’s
reference for quality in french
fries is now McCain.