Little Lady Foods
Published in "The Elk Grove Book," 2013

You will never see a “Little Lady Pizza” in the frozen foods section of the grocery store. But no matter what the brand name happens to be on your favorite frozen pizza, there’s a good chance it was actually produced by this Elk Grove Village bakery/manufacturing company. More...
Little Lady Foods, with two production facilities in Elk Grove Village and one in Gurnee, specializes in making premium and private-label frozen pizzas, gourmet sandwiches, paninis, wraps, breakfast items, and desserts for some of the largest and best-known food companies, foodservice outlets, and major retailers in the world. Some of the many services it provides for its customers include recipe creation, manufacturing, packaging, marketing, merchandizing, modification, and logistics. Approximately 65 percent of the products Little Lady Foods makes are destined for the freezers of supermarkets all over the nation as branded or private-label products, while the remainder of its output goes to more than 20,000 restaurants.

“We’re all about customization,” says John Geocaris, co-CEO and chairman of the company. “Each of our customers has different ideas and different requirements for the kind of products they would like to put out under their brand name. We’ll sit down with them and find out what kind of ingredients they want in their product, what kind of equipment they want used to bake it, how they want it packaged, how they want it shipped. Whatever it is they want, we’ll find a way to do it for them.”

This tradition of accommodating a customer’s foodservice needs runs deep in the family’s history. John Geocaris and his brother Dan, who currently manage Little Lady Foods as joint CEOs, are third-generation food business entrepreneurs whose grandfather and father owned several pizza restaurants in Chicago. In 1984 their father, Angelo, bought Little Lady Foods, a small manufacturer owned by the Esposito family in the Wrigleyville neighborhood that had been producing frozen pizzas for small grocery chains since 1961, with the idea of producing his own brand of hand-made restaurant-quality pizzas.

The business quickly outgrew its Chicago facility and relocated to 2323 Pratt Boulevard in Elk Grove Village in 1988. By 1990 the Geocaris family had sold their brand, Bravissimo, to a marketing company and was producing it for them. They decided to re-focus the business entirely on customized product development and production. Little Lady Foods won accounts from major food companies throughout the 1990s.

“Over half of our customers have been with us for ten or more years,” says Geocaris. “During that time, we’ve worked on many different development projects with our customers and have grown along with them.”

As of 2012, the company had transformed from a small business of five employees with yearly sales of $100,000 to a corporation of three production facilities with sales of $200 million a year. It employs about 800 workers and churns out more than five million pizzas and three million sandwiches a week.

There can be many reasons why a food company will choose to contract out the production of its food products, Geocaris explains. Some of Little Lady Foods’ customers, such as a food company founded by a famous actor which donates all of its after-tax proceeds to charity, act as marketing companies for their brands and don’t manufacture any of their products. With other customers, certain products may not fit into their manufacturing environment or, in the case of restaurants, are too time-consuming to be made on-site.

“Each customer has different needs, but we work with them to provide a total supply chain solution,” says Geocaris. “For example, some customers have their own recipes or formulas they want us to follow and only want us to figure out how to mass-produce it. Close to three-quarters of the time, however, they will want us to develop everything from scratch for them.” Since Little Lady Foods maintains a fully-staffed culinary center for recipe creation, testing, and development, Geocaris says this poses no problems.

The culinary center is located in a 55,000-square-foot facility on Pratt Avenue in Elk Grove Village, along with two of its pizza production lines. Two other pizza production lines are located in another nearby 35,000-square-foot facility. The company’s Gurnee plant devotes two of its four lines to hand-held frozen sandwiches, paninis, and flatbreads, with pizzas running on the remaining two lines. In 2011, the company leased 20,000 square feet of office space across the street from the Elk Grove production facilities in order to move most of its employees into a central location. This released valuable room needed to keep up with Little Lady Foods’ ever-growing production needs.

The company stays on top of all of the changing trends in the food industry in order to provide whatever their customers might want, whether it’s organic or low-carbohydrate ingredients, multigrain or flavored crusts, or smaller snack sizes. Little Lady Foods also offers its customers a plethora of variety in both its ingredients and its baking and production methods.

Pizza toppings can run the gamut from traditional items such as tomato sauce, pepperoni, sausage, and onions to more unconventional ingredients like Alfredo sauce, Canadian bacon, Jamaican jerk chicken, pineapple, avocado, or fire-roasted mixed vegetables. As for baking methods, Little Lady Foods prides itself on using both conventional wire mesh conveyorized ovens and custom stone-fired brick ovens. The brick ovens set Little Lady Foods apart from most other frozen pizza manufacturers and give pizza crusts a unique texture that is crispier on the bottom and chewier on the top.

The company can also supply a variety of options in dough handling and mixing such as sheeting or dough pressing, and packaging methods depending on the customer’s needs, such as shrink wrappers or flow wrappers.

Much of the company’s equipment consists of mobile stations on wheels, which can be swapped out depending on which product is being run on a particular line.

“High-end pizzas might have high-quality toppings like fire-roasted mixed vegetables that are put on by hand, while the sauce is deposited by a machine,” says Geocaris. “After the sauce is applied, we can then wheel in a manual station for the hand-applied toppings. If the next product being run uses toppings that are put on automatically, we can wheel out the manual station and slip in automated meat or vegetable topping machines, which slice and apply the toppings in predetermined patterns, according to the customer’s requirements.”

All products at Little Lady Foods are frozen in state-of-the-art, 40-foot-long nitrogen tunnels, which freeze food at sub-zero temperatures in only two minutes to ensure that the product tastes as fresh as possible.

The company also follows stringent quality and safety standards. All three of Little Lady Foods’ production facilities are inspected by the U. S. Department of Agriculture, and all three have attained the highest level, Level 3, of the Safe Quality Food (SQF) 2000 certification, which means they comply with all international and domestic food safety regulations. This includes screening and metal detection of all products for foreign materials, as well as proper handling and preparation of raw ingredients to prevent pathogen-related illnesses. The plants are also audited by the American Institute of Baking (AIB) and have received its highest rating of “Superior” every year since 1995.

“Since we have so many national customers, it’s important that they trust us to produce the highest-quality products,” says Geocaris. “We’re the only pizza manufacturer we know of that has a Level 3 SQF rating in all of its facilities, and we work hard to maintain that.”

Little Lady Foods continues to experiment with innovative new ideas and recipes to take frozen food beyond its usual boundaries. It produces a premium line of gourmet Mexican pizzas from famous chef Rick Bayless and plans to partner with another prestigious chef soon. It will also help some of its customers expand their breakfast sandwich lines, and is even working on frozen dessert pizzas with fruit and other sweet ingredients for other clients.

“Like I said, we’re all about customization,” Geocaris says. “We’ll do whatever it takes to help our customers’ brands be everything they want them to be.”

Changing the World Cup by Cup -- The journey, progress and future of fair-trade coffee

(published in the April 2007 issue of Specialty Coffee Retailer magazine)

“May I have a cup of fair trade coffee, please?”

You may be hearing this request more often from your customers, as the organized human rights and economic movement known as Fair Trade gains awareness in the U.S.

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Many customers are beginning to realize that their morning latte or cappuccino is ultimately coming from small coffee farmers in developing countries who receive prices for their harvest that are less than the costs of production. Usually located in remote areas, these farmers are often forced to sell to local middlemen – known as “coyotes” in Latin America – who pay them a fraction of the market price. Although the world price for coffee usually hovers around $1.00 per pound, most of these small coffee farmers earn less than 50¢ per pound, forcing them into a cycle of debt and poverty.

The Fair Trade coffee movement, begun in the mid-1980s when world coffee prices first began a sharp descent, is designed to create an equitable and fair partnership between buyers and producers in major coffee-growing regions such as Africa, Asia, Mexico, Central America and South America.

“You have to remember what the founders of Fair Trade were responding to 20 years ago,” said Rodney North, spokesperson for Equal Exchange, the oldest and largest for-profit Fair Trade company in the U. S. “They saw that the large profits some people were enjoying in the coffee business were not filtering down to the people who actually produce the world’s coffee; that these small farmers remained as poor as they were 100 years ago.”

“The purpose of the Fair Trade movement is not charity,” agreed Tex Dworkin, spokesperson for Global Exchange, an international rights organization which promotes social, economic and environmental justice around the world. “It’s about ensuring that people are compensated fairly for their work and treated with the respect they deserve.”

The Fair Trade movement actually encompasses much more than just coffee. Fair Trade certification is currently available in the U. S. for coffee, tea, herbs, cocoa, chocolate, fresh fruit (bananas, mango, pineapple and grapes), sugar, rice and spices such as vanilla. But because coffee is one of the three most traded commodities in the world and is vital to many countries’ economies, Fair Trade Certified™ (FTC) coffee is now the fastest- growing segment of the $11 billion U. S. specialty coffee market, according to TransFair USA, a member of the international Fairtrade Labeling Organizations and the only independent third-party certifier of Fair Trade products in the U. S.

Fair Trade basics
The basic principle of Fair Trade is fair pricing – a guaranteed minimum floor price paid to farmers regardless of market fluctuations in the price of the commodity, plus an additional premium for certified organic products. (More than 60% of all Fair Trade coffee is organically grown.)

According to TransFair USA, the minimum Fair Trade price set for most products, including coffee, is intended to cover the cost of sustainable production. For “washed arabica” (the highest quality coffee), the Fair Trade minimum price is currently set at $1.26 per pound, plus 15¢ per pound if the coffee is certified organic. If the world market price rises above this minimum price, the Fair Trade minimum price rises accordingly and becomes the world market price. Importers must also pay an additional 5¢ per pound as a “social premium,” to be spent by cooperatives on community and business development projects.

“Many cooperatives are able to negotiate higher rates for themselves,” said Nicole Chettero, spokesperson for TransFair USA. “For example, although the minimum price for Fair Trade certified organic coffee is $1.41 per pound, the average price paid in 2006 was $1.48 per pound.”

Besides fair pricing, the other Fair Trade principles as established by the Fairtrade Labeling Organizations (FLO) are:

• Fair labor conditions – this includes safe working conditions, adequate living wages, and strict prohibition of forced child labor.

• Direct trade – Fair Trade importers purchase directly from Fair Trade producers as much as possible, eliminating superfluous middlemen and enabling the farmers to develop the business skills necessary to compete in the global marketplace.

• Democratic organizations – Fair Trade farmers are freely allowed to form cooperatives, unions or other groups that decide democratically how to invest their premiums.

• Community development – Fair Trade farmers invest their premiums in social and business development projects such as scholarship programs, healthcare services, and quality improvement training.

• Environmental sustainability – the use of harmful chemicals and genetically modified products are strictly prohibited in favor of environmentally sustainable farming methods that protect farmers’ health and preserve valuable ecosystems for future generations.

“When you buy coffee with the Fair Trade certification label on it,” said Chettero, “it is a guarantee that the coffee was produced according to these criteria.”

Producer groups who wish to become Fair Trade certified must first apply to FLO, a consortium of Fair Trade groups in Japan, Canada, Mexico, Australia, New Zealand, the U. S. and 15 European countries. Once a producer group’s written application is approved, a regionally based FLO inspector visits the group to determine whether it meets Fair Trade criteria. FLO also re-certifies producer groups every year, and reviews financial documents and transactions to cross-check the chain of custody and ensure that premiums are being paid directly to the farmer.

U. S. companies that wish to offer FTC products must purchase from FLO-certified Fair Trade producer groups; pay TransFair USA a per-pound fee for certification; regularly report purchases and sales of Fair Trade certified products; and sign a licensing agreement and letter of intent with TransFair USA. TransFair also encourages U. S. companies to commit converting at least 5% of their total purchase volume to FTC products within the first two years of launching labeled products.

Fair Trade benefits
Since 1999, when it began certifying products, TransFair USA estimates that 1.5 million farmers and workers in Latin America, Asia, and Africa have gained social and environmental benefits from Fair Trade practices. The number of people helped by Fair Trade increases to about 5 million, said Chettero, when the family members of all of those workers are considered.

“When farmers receive a fair price for their product, they can afford to feed their families and put their children through school instead of putting them to work in the fields,” she said.

Examples of the social benefits that have resulted from the economic stability provided by Fair Trade practices include:

• the successful prevention of the cultivation of more than 1,600 acres of coca and poppy used to produce illicit drugs in Colombia
• the establishment of a women’s reproductive health program in Nicaragua
• the formation of a fund that sends local kids in the highlands of Guatemala to college for the first time.

Environmental benefits resulting from participation in Fair Trade practices include:

• soil and water conservation through composting, terracing, and reforestation
• the preservation of crucial habitats for wildlife by growing coffee under the shade of natural forest canopy
• the elimination of pesticides and other harmful chemicals through the use of organic growing methods.


“The benefits derived from Fair Trade go above and beyond a fair price,” said Chettero. “We’ve even found that domestic violence goes down because of better communication and improved financial security. Some cooperatives even specifically prohibit spousal abuse. In the end, it’s all about personal empowerment and overall community well-being.”

Fair Trade and the coffee retail industry
Has increased consumer awareness of the Fair Trade movement led to an increase in coffee retailers who are offering FTC brews?

“Absolutely,” said Chettero. “Fair Trade coffee sales have more than doubled in the past two years, with retail sales growing from less than $50 million in 2000 to nearly $500 million in 2005. As consumers become more aware of the origins of their food, they also become more concerned about the working conditions of the people who produce it and its environmental impact. They demand change with their dollars.”

According to TransFair USA, this increased demand has led to more than 250 companies offering FTC coffee in over 20,000 retail outlets across the country, including Safeway, Trader Joe’s, Wild Oats, Whole Foods, Albertson’s, Publix, Harris Teeter, and numerous national café chains such as Dunkin Donuts and Starbucks.

Although some organizations accuse the Starbucks chain of making only a token effort toward Fair Trade, Chettero said that Starbucks is actually the single largest importer of FTC coffee in terms of volume (11.5 million pounds in 2005). According to TransFair USA, more than 3.7% of all Starbucks coffee is Fair Trade certified (this includes Costco’s Kirkland Signature brand, which is roasted by Starbucks, as well as Starbucks’ own Café Estima™ blend). That percentage is up from less than 1% when the chain introduced it in 2000.

Other large-volume retailers are also getting into the act. In 2005, fast-food giant McDonald’s Corp. began selling organic Fair Trade coffee in 658 outlets throughout New England and the Albany, NY area.

Most coffee retailers consider offering Fair Trade brews a good business decision. Besides tapping into increased customer demand, they also find Fair Trade coffee to be of high quality and taste. More than 80% of Fair Trade coffee in the U. S. is shade-grown, which allows the coffee bean to develop more natural sugar, less caffeine, and better flavor by slowing down the maturation process. This leads to Fair Trade coffee being consistently ranked high for taste by Coffee Review, the leading coffee buying guide.

These benefits do not necessarily come at a higher price for either retailers or consumers. Because Fair Trade shortens the distance between producer and buyer, and eliminates the large percentage taken by middlemen, most experts say that the price of Fair Trade coffee is comparable to other specialty coffees.

“A 12-ounce bag of certified organic Free Trade coffee priced at $7.99 is comparable to a bag of gourmet coffee that you can find at any local supermarket,” said Dworkin. “And as any economics professor can tell you, if the demand increases the price will go down.”

Retailers can help increase demand for their Fair Trade coffee by marketing it prominently with educational posters, brochures, and point-of-purchase items, and by displaying it along with main-stream products instead of relegating it to a “specialty” section, experts say.

The future of Fair Trade
Most organizations involved in the Fair Trade coffee movement devote much of their efforts to increasing consumer awareness. Consumer education runs the gamut from grass-roots efforts to organization-sponsored experiences such as farmer visits to large-scale events such as Fair Trade Month, sponsored by TransFair USA every October. In 2006, more than 9,700 U. S. retail locations participated in Fair Trade Month promotions.

Oxfam America, a non-profit affiliate of Oxfam International that works to end global poverty, has an extensive outreach program for Fair Trade, according to Shayna Harris, Coffee Program Organizer. One of its newest campaigns involves having student groups or community organizations adopt a local grocery store, develop a relationship with the store manager, and encourage them to carry Free Trade products. Oxfam America is also promoting the recently-released documentary film Black Gold, which follows the efforts of an Ethiopian coffee cooperative manager to find a better price for his farmers’ coffee.

Lutheran World Relief, a Christian organization that works with partners in 35 countries to combat the causes of poverty, has been promoting Fair Trade coffee since 1986 through Equal Exchange, according to Kattie Somerfeld, Fair Trade Project Coordinator. In 2003, Lutheran World Relief partnered with the Women of Evangelical Lutheran Churches in America and challenged them to double the amount of Fair Trade coffee their individual parishes purchased, from 45 to 90 tons. The group exceeded the challenge by ultimately buying 99 tons. Purchases have continued to increase every year, to 140 tons in 2005.

Many of these organizations find that increased awareness of the Fair Trade coffee movement leads to consumer discovery of other Fair Trade products made by small-scale artisans such as crafts, clothing, textiles, furniture, jewelry, and ceramics.

“We find that many people first discover Fair Trade through their coffee cup, but then realize that it can manifest itself through many other consumer choices,” said Carmen Iezzi, executive director of the Fair Trade Federation. “We would like to educate as many consumers as possible and let them know there is a Fair Trade alternative to almost everything they buy.”

Last Minute Buys -- Supplement your sales with impulse items

(published in the March/April 2008 issue of Tobacco Retailer magazine)
We’ve all done it. We stop at a store to pick up a particular item, when our attention is caught by something else that we decide we need. Impulse buying is a mysterious yet well-known phenomenon. Money magazine estimates that two-thirds of all purchases are unplanned. Savvy retailers can tie into their customers’ spontaneity by stocking plenty of those extra little items that tweak the buying urge.
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Obvious Impulse Items . . .
For tobacco retailers, smoking-related knick-knacks are the most logical impulse items to carry. The Lighter Leash®, patented by Barproducts.com of Largo, Florida, is therefore a natural.


The Lighter Leash is a retractable holder on a strong 36-inch nylon cord that clips conveniently to clothing and gives quick access to any standard size lighter (sold separately). Lighter Leash was the brainchild of Barproducts president Mark Hastings, whose background as a bartender had taught him how hard it was to keep a lighter handy to light up his customers’ cigarettes.

The Original Lighter Leash clips snugly to a belt, pocket or skirt, and retails for $1.99. The Premium Lighter Leash is designed to clip to belt loops or purse straps and retails for $2.99. Both the Original and Premium Lighter Leashes are also available in mini sizes to carry smaller or slimmer standard lighters.

Lighter Leashes come in a variety of colors so customers can match the color of their favorite brand lighters. Lighter Leash provides 30-count and 60-count standard display units which include countertop jug displays or header cards with clip strips for vertical presentation. Lighter Leash can also design custom displays (working with in-house or third-party merchandise presentation coordinators) for use with private label logos.

“Although convenience stores and chain drug stores are definitely our largest market, Lighter Leashes are also ideal for tobacco shops,” says John McCall, director of North American sales for Lighter Leash. “It’s the perfect match to any standard lighter. The display units look great next to lighter racks at the checkout counter, and the small packaging and low pricing definitely help drive impulse buying.”

Lighter Leashes come with a money-back guarantee to retailers and distributors if they don’t sell, but McCall says that usually isn’t a problem. (The company boasted last quarter sales figures of about $400,000.) “You may easily double the profits of your lighter category with the addition of Lighter Leashes,” he says. “It’s a proven high volume sales item. People who buy them will usually buy a lighter, too, and come back for another lighter when it’s empty. We supply anywhere from 35,000 to 60,000 retailers all over the world, and many of them go through a display unit every week.”

Lighter Leash also offers other retractable products that can help drive impulse buying such as the Zip Stick® (a retractable lip balm reel), the FlashTender® (a retractable combination lighter and bottle opener) and the L.E.D. Lighter Leash, a limited quantity item that flashes tiny L.E.D. (light-emitting diode) lights when the cord is pulled.

Another product made especially for smokers which can add up to increased sales if prominently displayed by checkout counters is the Smoke-n-Odor™ Smoke-out candle, carried by The Candle Chateau of Winston-Salem, North Carolina.


“Our Smoke-n-Odor candles are great for smokers who share an environment with non-smokers or who just want a different fragrance in the room,” says Candle Chateau owner Boyce Duncan. “Smoke-n-Odor candles use a specially formulated heat-activated process that both neutralizes cigarette odor and replaces it with another scent.”

Smoke-n-Odor products come in about 40 different fragrances, although Duncan says that the fruit scents such as Apple, Berry, Orange, and Peach are the most popular. Except for special seasonal fragrances such as Christmas Tree and Holidays, which are not available in tins and votives, all other fragrances are available in a variety of styles, shapes and sizes. These include 9-oz. hexagon, 16-oz. apothecary, 26-oz. apothecary, 4-oz. crock jars, votives, and Tin-Can-dles™, which are especially convenient for traveling.

Lighters are probably the most popular accessory items that tobacco retailers carry, but you can also stoke impulse buying with them by offering something in addition to the usual brands. Lucky Sales, Inc., a Greer, South Carolina-based distributor of lighters and other products, offers unusual novelty lighters shaped like such objects as baseball bats, guitars, and vehicles, as well as larger table lighters.

“We carry over 100 styles of novelty lighters because they’re good for impulse buys,” says John Ma, manager of Lucky Sales. “Novelty lighters grab people’s attention because they’re something a little different from the run-of-the-mill pocket lighter.”

. . . And Some Not-So-Obvious Impulse Items
Impulse buys do not necessarily have to be tobacco or smoking-related in order to be a winning item for tobacco retailers to stock. The essence of impulse buying is that it can be triggered by any small, conveniently-placed article that may or may not have anything to do with the product we originally intended to buy.

In addition to its electronic, disposable, and novelty lighters, Lucky Sales also offers items such as sunglasses (in designer, clip-on, hologram and children’s styles), reading glasses, pouches and cases, key chains, and health and beauty products such as toothbrushes and grooming kits.

“People are always losing things like sunglasses or key chains,” says Ma. “If you have a display of them conveniently placed near the register, it reminds them that they need to replace them.”

Los Angeles-based Eagle Distributors, Inc., a major supplier to the convenience store industry, carries a myriad of other incidental articles that can spur impulse buying. It re-packs brand-name over-the-counter medicines such as Advil®, Nyquil®, Alka-Seltzer®, Pepto-Bismol®, Excedrin®, and Motrin® in convenient blister packs as well as 25-count and 50-count dispensers. It offers its own brand-name of Kiran® shaving razors, shaving cream, nail clippers, and air fresheners. It also carries general merchandise such as band-aids, bottle openers, batteries, miniature toys and games such as dice and dominoes, and even long-stemmed roses with vases.

Items like these utilize shopping psychology. Customers may not know they need a particular article at first, but if they see it, it makes them think “Yes, I could use that.”

Price Master Corporation of Woodside, New York, another major distributor of convenience and dollar store products, works on the same principle. It carries a product list of more than 3000 leading brands such as Duracell®, Tylenol®, Trojan®, Colgate®, BIC®, Chapstick®, Kodak®, Pop Rocks®, and Bubbaloo® -- all meant to remind customers of articles they need or even simply would like to have.

“The kind of products carried by the retailers we supply depends on where they’re located and what kind of store they are,” says Imat Dawoud, vice president of sales for Price Master. “But the hottest item right now that all of our stores are really demanding is the 5-Hour Energy drink made by Living Essentials. These drinks could be a good impulse item for smokers, also, since they are supposed to give increased energy without the crash effect of other energy drinks.”

5-Hour Energy® Chasers are available in Lemon-Lime, Citrus, Orange, Berry and Decaf flavors. A 2-oz. bottle contains an energy-boosting mixture of B vitamins, amino acids and enzymes, with only 4 calories, no sugar or carbs, and about the same amount of caffeine as in a single cup of coffee.

Although clothing is not a product generally associated with tobacco retailers, it is also a common impulse purchase. Although more expensive and requiring more display space than the usual small articles, a few well-chosen pieces of clothing such as T-shirts can be a worthwhile addition to a tobacco store’s impulse selection.

Bad Habits of Laguna Niguel, California specializes in supplying humorous novelty items such as T-shirts and bumper stickers to convenience and variety stores, gift and card shops, drug and dollar stores, tourist shops, and flea market vendors.

“We have a few items that are specifically geared to smoking,” says Bad Habits owner Howard Altman, “like our T-shirt that says ‘I Smoke and Drink, So I’ll Have Something to Give Up If My Health Starts to Go.’ We also have bumper stickers that say things like ‘Harassing Me About My Smoking May Be Hazardous To Your Health’ and ‘If My Smoking Bothers You, Don’t Breathe.’ These definitely make good impulse buys at places such as tobacco and head shops. We also have a lot of ‘Over The Hill’ and golfing T-shirts that can fit into these venues, as well as smaller items such as stickers and magnets.”

Where To Place Impulse Items
Just as in real estate, the key to moving your impulse items is “location, location, location.” Although the checkout counter is the most obvious location and is always a great place to start, the layout of your establishment can also suggest other good areas.

The on-line business blog AllBusiness.com recommends positioning impulse products near related category areas, such as lighter holders near the lighters or candles and air fresheners near the ash trays. Try finding places where customers are not preoccupied with their intended reason for entering the store. Consider areas customers have to pass through while looking for staple items, such as at the ends of aisles or between specific departments.

If space allows and you have the right display vehicles such as wire racks, try strategically placing impulse items to each side of the checkout lane. Surrounding customers with merchandise increases the chances that a product will catch their eye while they are approaching the cash register.

Of course, the available space in your establishment will determine not only where you place impulse items but also the amount of items that you decide to stock. Too many impulse items in your store can be overkill, slowing down your customers as they make their purchases and resulting in dissatisfied patrons. In some stores, it’s better to go with a smaller selection of well-chosen impulse articles. Most retailers find that anything, even candy or breath mints, adds to revenues if positioned correctly in eye-catching displays.

In general, go with impulse items that are straightforward and simple, preferably in attention-grabbing bright colors or designs. (Also, never underestimate the “cute” factor.) Impulse items should not require customers to read long descriptions or select from among a wide range of styles or models. Remember, as well, that impulse items are typically smaller in price, size and weight. Large and/or expensive items are not impulse purchases and should not be marketed and presented as such.

Finally, if you’re having a sale, place impulse items near the sales items. “After all,” says AllBusiness.com, “people are in a good mood after finding a bargain, and they may decide to buy more with the money they’ve saved.”

Digital vs. Conventional Proofing – Which Should You Use?

(published in the August 2003 issue of Wallace’s customer e-newsletter, Beyond Ink)
Still asking your print provider for a “Matchprint proof” for a job on which you’re only checking content? If you are, you may want to explore the possibilities of switching to digital proofing.
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The 3M Matchprint is a popular proofer used for conventional proofs (also known as analog, manual or film-based proofs). Conventional proofers create the proof using the same film that will be used to make the printing plates. Digital proofing, on the other hand, skips this step by creating the proof from digital data on output devices such as the DuPont Digital WaterProof, Kodak Approval, and Iris 4Print.

Both methods have their uses, but as the printing industry moves toward the computer-to-plate (CTP) process, it would be more to customers’ advantage to start requesting digital proofs, according to Lynne Andrews, Systems Manager at Wallace’s Elk Grove Village, IL commercial print facility.

The Advantages of Digital Proofing

“Digital proofing is normally faster than conventional, because you can create an actual proof in roughly the time it would take you to create and check the film for a conventional proof,” Andrews said. “So although the price is relatively the same for both methods, digital proofing actually saves more, because time translates into money for a lot of people in this industry.”

Another advantage to digital proofing, Andrews said, is that if the customer wants to make changes to the job – which is very common during the pre-press stage – the printer won’t have the added expense of creating a new set of film.

Customers who prefer conventional proofs usually do so out of habit and because they’ve built up a certain comfort level with them, according to Andrews. “They usually feel that conventional proofing is infallible; they feel that human error doesn’t enter into it; and they feel that the equipment used for it is very accurate,” she said.

“All of this may have been true several years ago, but now they’re misconceptions,” Andrews continued. “Customers who still prefer conventional proofs have usually been burned once using the digital process – such as signing off on a color proof that couldn’t be matched on press because the printer was using an older proofer. However, the new digital proofers available today usually have problems such as color drift under control. So even customers who may have had a bad experience with digital should give the advanced technology a try.”

The Way of the Future

One more reason for customers to move toward digital proofing, Andrews said, is because that’s how the printing industry is moving as the ability to incorporate an all-digital workflow makes computer-to-plate technology (CTP) a more viable pre-press option.

With the CTP process, also known as direct-to-plate, plants are able to go from digital files to directly imaging the printing plate. This eliminates the costly and time-consuming steps of outputting and stripping film, then imaging and processing the plates.

An increasing number of customers are seeing the advantages in cost-savings and turnaround to be gained from CTP. For example, the Grainger Industrial Supply catalog, one of the largest industrial catalogs in the United States, is produced at Wallace’s Hillside, IL facility using CTP.

“Computer-to-plate is the way of the future,” Andrews said, “and the whole advantage of CTP is that it doesn’t use film, just like digital proofing. Customers who want to utilize CTP or computer-to-press in their print jobs, but continue to ask for conventional proofs, are asking for an extra, non-automated step in an essentially automated process.”

As digital technology evolves, it’s even possible that manufacturers may stop supporting certain conventional proofers. For example, Andrews said that DuPont is curtailing support for its Cromalin conventional proofer, which uses powders to mix spot colors, in favor of its WaterProof model, which uses ink.

“While DuPont isn’t throwing out the Cromalin, at the same time they’re not releasing any new powders and they’re raising the price on it, because in the future they will be making toners for it only in very limited capacities,” Andrews commented. “So it’s always a good idea to find alternatives.”

When To Stay With Conventional Proofing

There are a few instances in which conventional proofing is still the best option, one of which involves the issue of size.

“Right now, the CreoScitex Spectrum conventional proofer is the only proofer that can handle color that’s larger than 4 pages,” Andrews said. “If you have a 30” x 40” poster, for example, you would need to run two digital proofs. In this situation, it would be cheaper to go with conventional.”

The other circumstance that would demand conventional over digital proofing, Andrews said, is a job with a lot of spot PMS (Pantone Matching System) colors. (Digital proofing uses only four-color process.)

Tips On Choosing Your Proof Options

• If the proof is strictly for content (the text or layout of the piece), always go digital. There’s nothing to be gained by requesting a conventional proof for content except more time and possibly extra cost if changes are made.
  
  
• For color (contract) proofs, use conventional proofers only if spot PMS color is being used or if the piece is larger than 4 pages.
  
  
• For most contract proofs, color accuracy can still be maintained with digital technology by requesting an ink draw-down – an ink sample on the same paper stock that will be used for the finished piece. Once the correct color is achieved, it can be canned for future use on the job.
  
  
• For jobs with spot PMS color, stick with conventional proofs to be on the safe side.

Getting Their Kicks on Route 66 - 23-day trek down 66 challenges cyclists

(published on Wednesday, May 15, 1996 in the Horizons section of the Naperville SUN)
Most retirees celebrate their new freedom with a long, leisurely vacation. Michael Tenzinger is going to climb on a bicycle and pedal almost 2,500 miles.
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Tenzinger will be one of 31 people, including his daughter, Marie, who will be participating in the first annual Pac Tour Route 66 Bicycle Tour. The cross-country odyssey will follow, as closely as possible, the original route of the “Main Street of America.”

The group will leave from Chicago’s Lake Shore Drive on June 1 (which happens to be Tenzinger’s 65th birthday) and will arrive in Santa Monica, Calif. on June 23, averaging a travel total of 100 miles a day.

The historic road begins at Michigan Avenue and Jackson Boulevard in Chicago, across from Grant Park, heads southwest to Joliet, continues southwest through Springfield into Missouri and Oklahoma, then generally west until it terminates at Santa Monica, Calif.

It was obliterated in the 1970s by the advent of the super highways such as Interstate 40, which cuts directly across Arkansas, Oklahoma, Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona on to California.

The trip is the brain-child of husband-and-wife team Lon Halderman and Susan Notorangeio, the directors of Wisconsin-based Pac Tour, which arranges cross-country and transcontinental bicycle tours. Both are accomplished cyclists who are each winners of Race Across America, a coast-to-coast bike marathon which involves pedaling day and night from one side of the country to the other in a total of eight or nine days, Tenzinger said.

For that matter, every person on the Route 66 Tour is an experienced cyclist. “They’d better be, if they’re going to keep up with Lon and Susan,” Tenzinger said with a laugh.

He and Marie (who first sparked his interest in cycling) have been pedaling for almost 10 years. They are both members of the Elmhurst Bike Club and have also been involved with the Naperville Bike Club.

Father and daughter train for long-distance events like this by “constant riding,” Tenzinger said – outdoors whenever weather permits, or indoors on a wind trainer. He admits, however, that “you can train all you want, and it’s never enough on long trips like this. The best you can do is hope your legs are in good shape and get into a routine.”

He cautioned that the Route 66 Tour is not for inexperienced or even “ordinary” cyclists, only for those accustomed to long-distance events.

It is not a race, however.

“The point is not how fast you can go,” he said, “it’s the endurance. It’s finding a pace you’re comfortable with and staying with it for hours.”

The Tenzingers, who live in Wheaton, will be joined on the tour by a diverse group of 12 women and 19 men from towns as close as Evanston, Skokie, and Champaign, Ill., and from countries as far as Spain, Switzerland, and the Netherlands. Other U. S. states represented on the trip include Arkansas, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Georgia, Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Texas and Wisconsin.

The 31 participants of the tour include a nine-person support crew driving three vans. “Their main purpose is to leap-frog ahead of us every 25 or 30 miles and hand out snacks and high-energy drinks,” Tenzinger said. “That’s important, because your body burns up most of its fuel after that amount of time when you’re cycling. There’s also a bike mechanic on hand to help with repairs if you need it.”

Good cyclists, however, carry their own repair kit and tire pump along with them, Tenzinger said, as well as about 15 ounces of water to re-hydrate themselves as they ride. He and Marie will tote “camel backs,” bladder-type containers strapped onto their backs that contain 70 ounces of water.

Although the cyclists will be expected to travel every day, rain or shine (“You can’t take a day off if you’re going to keep up with the time table,” Tenzinger said), they will take a well-deserved rest every night at various motels. They will also reward themselves at the journey’s end by flying themselves and their bicycles home.

Some of the motels the group is slated to stay in are original “motor courts” still in existence from the hey-day of Route 66 in the 1950s, such as the Will Rogers Motor Court in Tulsa, Oklahoma and the Wigwam Motel in Holbrook, Arizona.

These names bring back a nostalgic sense of the past, which, Tenzinger said, “is part of allure of the Route 66 Tour, the reason so many people are coming from so far away to ride it.

“Route 66 was the ‘Mother Road,’ or the ‘Main Street’ of America,” he said. “It’s the road the Oklahomans took to California to escape the Dust Bowl in the 1930s, so there’s a real feeling of freedom, of dreams for a better life, when you’re on it.”

According to Tenzinger, about 85 percent of the original route is still in existence, although it is no longer called Route 66. In places where the original route is no longer available, the group will travel on frontage roads that parallel it as much as possible.

Besides the chance to ride into the past, the biggest draw of the Route 66 Tour, Tenzinger said, is the physical challenge of pushing oneself to the limit.

“It’s the exuberance of it,” he said, “the thought that when you get to the end, you can say ‘I did it.’ “

Christmas Tree Farm Adds Beauty to the Season

(published Sunday, Dec. 13, 1992 in the Chicago Tribune's Southwest Tempo section)
Howard and Dorothy Hassert, owners of the Hassert Christmas Tree Farm, are preparing themselves for the onslaught of people who come every year to their 5½ acres outside of Romeoville for the old-fashioned activity of cutting down their own Christmas tree.
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Located off Joliet Road in DuPage Township, the Hasserts' old white house is surrounded by approximately 4,000 evergreen trees, mostly Scotch pine, waiting to be selected and taken home. For $20, customers are entitled to park their vehicles near the circular drive that runs through the property and wander through the rows to cut down "the best tree they can find," according to Howard Hassert.

"It doesn't matter how big or small it is, or even what it looks like," he said. "I've seen people insist on a tree that I think is ugly, but it doesn't matter. If they like it, it's theirs."

Saws can be brought from home, or are available at the shanty from which Hassert, his wife, and other family members accept payment. The Hasserts also can assist in felling the trees and tying them securely to vehicles for the trip home.

Hassert, whose family has farmed in the area for 131 years, has been selling trees from the property since 1950. He had thought up the idea of a Christmas tree farm 15 years earlier, he said, but was told by experts that evergreens wouldn't grow in Illinois.

"So I originally planted them just to see if they would grow," he said. "When they got to Christmas tree height I started selling them."

This is not to say, however, that the Hasserts haven't had their difficulties over the years with weather, contaminants, bad planting stock, deer and public taste.

"The first trees we bought were from the state, a kind called Golden Scotch," said Dorothy. "We ended up having to spray-paint them green, because no one wanted a yellow Christmas tree. We tried flocking them different colors one year, but that didn’t go over well, either. People are pretty traditional about their Christmas trees.”

The Hasserts do their best to keep up with the constant maintenance of weed-mowing, shearing and re-planting. Some problems are out of their control, however. Hassert still remembers the year he lost 7,000 seedlings because of bad planting stock. The recent droughts also have taken their toll, and prevented re- planting this year.

Deer tracks attest to the woodland creatures' presence on the farm, but damage has luckily been minimal, Hassert said, because food is still abundant for them elsewhere. Nature is resilient, though, and most of the trees prevail year after year.

"This is a good spot for tree farms," said Howard "We have about a dozen spots in this township where we could have places like this, and the need would always be there."

The advantages of trees are many, he said. They prevent soil from eroding, add nitrogen to the soil so that it will eventually grow better crops, create excess oxygen, and even take a certain amount of contaminants out of the air.

Then, of course, there is the opportunity evergreens provide for a traditional holiday experience. "We've never had any problems with demand," said Dorothy "not even during the '60s when a lot of people were using artificial Christmas trees. Some people still use artificial trees in the living room, so they won't get needles in the carpeting, but they want a real tree in their family room. If you keep a reasonable price, people will buy."

Approximately 400 trees are sold every year, the Hasserts said, from the time the farm opens for business the day after Thanksgiving, to the last minutes of searching on Christmas Eve. Busloads of schoolchildren often come for field trips, proudly bringing back a small tree for their classrooms. Many customers are repeats, Dorothy said, and come from as far as northern Indiana.

"Some of them are even bringing their grandchildren in and saying they want them to have the same experience they had of cutting their own Christmas tree."

The Hasserts are nursery-licensed in the state of Illinois, and belong to the National Christmas Tree Growers Association. To reach the Hassert Christmas Tree Farm from the west, take the Stevenson Expressway south to exit 269 (Joliet Road). The farm is about one mile south on the left-hand side. From the east, take Illinois Highway 7 to Illinois Highway 53. The farm is about a quarter of a mile north of White Fence Farm Restaurant. Call 708-739-7951.

Resume

Experience

2006 – present: M2Media360, Patch.com, Mometrix Media LLC, Matthew D. Walker Publishing
Free-lance Journalist
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• Researched and authored feature articles about industry trends and products of interest for Specialty Coffee Retailer and Tobacco Retailer trade magazines
  
  
• Contributed news articles for New Lenox Patch.com, a local community news Web site sponsored by AOL.com
  
  
• Researched and wrote Web content on various careers for educational publishing company Mometrix Media
  
  
• Wrote business profiles for "The Elk Grove Book" for Matthew D. Walker Publishing

2004 – 2006: RR Donnelley, Downers Grove and Chicago, IL
Corporate Communications Specialist

• Solicited, gathered, edited, and wrote articles and updated Web pages for monthly internal e-newsletter called Quick Hits, designed to highlight sales success stories and other pertinent sales information from across all RR Donnelley divisions
  
  
• Created and edited other marketing or corporate communications pieces as needed e.g. brochures, bulletins, newsletter articles, training guides, proposals, executive summaries
  
  
• Assisted Director of Public Relations in researching and writing RR Donnelley trade press releases
  
  
• Assisted in updating corporate Internet and Intranet Websites on as-needed basis
  
  
• As Corporate Webmaster, responded to or forwarded all customer and internal e-mail enquiries

2003—2004: Moore Wallace, an RR Donnelley company, Downers Grove, IL
Marketing Communications Writer

• Wrote and edited articles and created Web pages for bi-monthly customer e-newsletter called Beyond Ink. This newsletter reached approximately 2,000 customers and prospects; had an average 50% click-through rate; and generated 30 requests for samples and sales rep follow-ups.
  
  
• Contributed to Moore Wallace’s Beyond Ink on Paper print technology seminars by regularly updating the registration Web site and creating HTML e-mail invitations. These extremely successful seminars (held in strategic market areas all over the country approximately 5 times a year) showcased all of Moore Wallace’s capabilities and resulted in $15 million of additional business. Also assisted in set-up of booths and registration procedures at seminars.
  
  
• Contributed to Moore Wallace’s Creative Brain direct mail campaign by creating HTML e-mails inviting prospects to visit our Website and register for samples and prizes. This campaign resulted in a 3.6% response rate and $32,000 in additional business.
  
  
• Wrote and edited other marketing and corporate communications pieces as needed

1997 – 2003: Wallace, Inc., Lisle, IL
Internet Content Coordinator

• Created all text for corporate Internet Website in HTML. Updated Website information on as-needed basis; posted job listings and press releases; responded to Webmaster e-mail enquiries. Also played major role in developing internal Intranet Website by gathering, organizing and converting to HTML all content for new sections.
  
  
• Researched and wrote all Wallace trade press releases in absence of regular Director of Public Relations
  
  
• Wrote and edited other marketing communication pieces as needed

1986 – 1992: SUN Publications, Naperville, Lisle, and Bolingbrook, IL

1992: Asst. City Editor/Business, Naperville SUN

• Editing, paste-up for business, automotive and real estate sections
  1988 – 1992: Business Reporter, Naperville SUN
  
• New business stories, promotions, trends and local organization profiles
  1986 – 1988: General Assignment Reporter/Copy Editor, Lisle, Bolingbrook and Naperville SUN
  
• Village government, school boards, news features, human interest stories, columns

Education
B.A. Journalism, Psychology, College of St. Francis, Joliet, IL