Hormel honors Crown Cork and Seal
Managers and workers at Crown Cork and Seal in South Connellsville on Tuesday received a significant honor from a $3.9 billion company. Hormel Foods presented its Spirit of Excellence Award to Joe Pierce, president of the closure division, in a brief program at the factory.
“The award is for your work in our SQM (supplier quality management) program,’ Curtis Southard, Hormel representative, said.
Crown Cork and Seal’s Plant 77, formerly Anchor Hocking’s Cap Plant, turns from 60,000 to 70,000 sheets of metal per day into lids for some of Hormel products. Southard said Hormel deals with “hundreds of suppliers. There are 42 in our purchasing division that we are presenting this award to.’
It is the first time Crown Cork and Seal’s Fayette County facility has won the ward. Southard said the company had an overall 96.6 percent rating, something workers “should be very proud of.’
Jerry Gresko, Plant 77 director of operations, said the facility employs 172 people. It manufactures 101 different styles of closures for such companies as Gerber Baby Foods, Snapple, Clausen Pickles, Smuckers and Tropicana.
“We have 9,289 different labels that we can apply to those closures,’ he added.
While the local company has no immediate plans for new hires or expansion, Gresko said it is “moving forward in a competitive market to be the leader in closures.’
Pierce, noting that he has always viewed the closure business as declining, said that many in Crown Cork and Seal “have a kind of bunker mentality. By that I mean we want to be the last supplier in this business.’
Pierce also commended the workers at the plant.
“This is not Joe Pierce’s award. It’s an award for the people in Connellsville.’
Hormel has had a decades-long association with Plant 77. Many of the workers there are veterans with 30 and 40 years on the job.
Southard said Hormel wants to build “bigger and stronger brands’ and will do this by working closely with suppliers like Crown Cork and Seal, which was founded in 1892.
“We want to add more value to our products and make them easier for the consumer to use. We will expand our food service business and exercise financial discipline. We currently have 30 items that are number one or two in the marketplace,’ he said.
Southard explained Hormel uses its SQM program “to know just how well our suppliers are doing. It also gives us insight into new products and services we can develop.’
SQM, he said, measures how well suppliers deliver products, provides administrative requirements and auditing, and sees how well the suppliers meet requirements and provide customer service. Percentile ratings are given each quarter and averaged for the year.
While Plant 77 had some occurrences that pulled down its rating, overall it did very well, Southard said. “Every year you have progressed in this program,’ he added. “You take the information we are providing and use it to improve your relationship with us. SQM overall is a pretty in-depth process.’
Southard also gave the local company assurances about the future.
“We are in an acquisition mode and we plan to grow,’ he said.
In the past year, Hormel, he said, bought Diamond Crystal Brands, repurchased more than 484,000 shares of its common stock and started Precept Foods LLC.
“Our earnings in 2002 were $189 million,’ he said.
Crown Cork and Seal operates 208 plants in 45 countries in three main divisions organized along geographical lines. It employs 33,000 people worldwide. William Painter, who invented the bottle cap, a “crown cork,” founded the company in Baltimore. Plant 77 in South Connellsville belongs to the company’s Americas Divisions, which has operations from Canada to Argentina.
Crown Cork and Seal had total revenues of more than $7 billion last year.