From the Ground Up - McCain Foods Limited

LEFT: View from the airstrip
near Harrison and Wallace’s
houses, looking across the
potato fields and river valley.
rIGhT: McCain’s head office
in downtown Toronto is on
the thirty-sixth floor of BCE
Place (centre foreground).
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“I like it here,” he answered. “It’s nice. It doesn’t make any economic sense at all.
It means a huge travel bill and a lot of weariness. We’re perfectly satisfied to be here
and to pay a certain price for that.” Part of the price is maintaining an airstrip so that
company planes can shuttle McCain personnel to and from Toronto. The airstrip,
which sports the McCain logo on its pavement, is not a luxury but a necessity if the
company is to keep its corporate headquarters in Florenceville.
In 1995, when Howard Mann arrived as president and CEO, McCain established a
global headquarters office in Toronto. As of 2007, CEO Dale Morrison and other key
executives were based on the thirty-sixth floor of Toronto’s BCE Place, on Bay Street,
the Canadian equivalent of Wall Street. The headquarters of McCain’s Canadian operations
are in Florenceville, where Fred Schaeffer, CEO of McCain Foods Canada,
lives. As well, some global functions, including the legal department, corporate engineering,
corporate agriculture, part of corporate financing and taxation, and the
data processing centre, remain in Florenceville. In 2006, the company announced a
$70 million plan to rebuild the Florenceville factory. It also decided to renovate the
head office, which is adjacent to the factory.
Because of the dramatic advances in communications, it may be more practical
in the twenty-first century to maintain the Florenceville head office than
it was in the company’s earlier years. Tony van Leersum recalls that, when he
joined McCain in 1978, there was no fax or email and just the occasional telex.
Most communication was by ordinary post and telegram. “As managing director
of continental Europe at the time I was allowed only one transatlantic phone
call a week, because of the high cost. Mail from New Brunswick to Holland took
twelve days. If posted in Maine, it took eight days.” Today, of course, Florenceville
f rom the Ground up
Air mcCain
From early on, the McCain planes and airfield behind their houses
made it possible for Harrison and Wallace to have a global reach
while remaining based in a small village. The first plane was a
little Piper Aztec (left) purchased in around 1963. A Mitsubishi
MU-2 was acquired in 1970 (below left, with the Aztec on the
Florenceville airfield) and used from 1970 to 1982. The Falcon
50 jet is now in use (below, at the Florenceville McCain hanger,
2002), along with the Learjet 45, pictured above preparing for
its scheduled early-morning run to Toronto, 2006.
the home front 139