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Bon Ton Sees Credit Rating Drop - Closing Greenbay Distribution Center
Bon Ton the owners of the former Retail chain Carson's experienced a credit rating drop this week from stable to negative and has stated that they will close a distribution center in Greenbay that is covered along with 23 stores by a $323 million mortgage.
The company has seen multiple years of sales decline and the recent economic slump in the housing market is likely having an impact on furniture and household sales. This troubled company's distribution center closing could signal weakness for many other companies that were in a stronger position prior to the real estate industry meltdown and credit tightening.
When people can't buy houses on credit, its unlikely that they will initially spend very much money on furniture or fancy bathroom lighting or anything else until the real estate and mortgage market either improves or people give up on owning a home and turn to renting an apartment or house.
Related Stories to Bon Ton Distribution Center closing
Bon-Ton to close Green Bay distribution center
Bizjournals.com, NC - Mar 28, 2008
The Bon-Ton Stores Inc. will close its 175000 square-foot distribution center in Green Bay and consolidate the merchandise-processing functions into ...
Bon-Ton to close distribution center CNNMoney.com
Bon-Ton Stores to consolidate Green Bay, Wis., distribution center Forbes
The Bon-Ton Stores, Inc. Announces the Consolidation of Its Green ... FOXBusiness
Pravda - PennLive.com
all 31 news articles »BONT
Green Bay Younkers' distribution center to close
Herald Times Reporter, WI - Mar 28, 2008
The Bon-Ton Stores, which owns Younkers and Younkers Furniture Gallery at Bay Park Square in Ashwaubenon, plans to close its 175000-square-foot distribution ...Fitch Affirms Bon-Ton's IDR at 'B'; Revises Outlook to Negative
Business Wire (press release), CA - Mar 13, 2008
The facility is secured by mortgages on 23 stores and one distribution center with an appraised value of approximately $328 million as of March 2006. ...
That's a Bad Mellon! Agropecuaria Montelibano Cantaloupes recalled in US and Canada
North America faced another test this week as cantaloupes from Honduras Company Agropecuaria Montelibano were recalled by its resellers such as Dole and Chiquitia.
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| A macro photo of the skin of a North American Cantaloupe. Photo taken from Shifting Pixel |
To date, the FDA has received reports of 50 illnesses in 16 states and nine illnesses in Canada linked to the consumption of cantaloupes. No deaths have been reported; however, 14 people have been hospitalized. The states are Arizona, California, Colorado, Georgia, Illinois, Missouri, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, Tennessee, Utah, Washington, and Wisconsin.
FDA Warns Of Salmonella Risk From Agropecuaria Montelibano - Food Safety
US Food inspectors have been deployed to Honduras to investigate this latest outbreak and problem with the US food supply. Over the last 2 years the US has experienced a rapidly growing number of food recalls, especially with fresh produce ranging from strawberries, to lettuce, spinach and more.
Related Stories on Cantaloupe Recall
Lawrence company recalls cantaloupe linked to salmonella
Boston Globe, United States - 11 hours ago
AP / March 30, 2008 LAWRENCE - A Lawrence company is recalling fresh-cut fruit products containing cantaloupe from a Honduran company the Food and Drug ...
Dole Voluntarily Recalls Tainted Honduran Cantaloupes
dBTechno, MA - 3 hours ago
Boston (dbTechno) - Dole Fresh Fruit Co. has decided to join others in recalling tainted cantaloupes. These cantaloupes were imported from Honduras and are ...Health Highlights: March 30, 2008
U.S. News & World Report, DC - 4 hours ago
Heart patients who have two coronary stents used during an emergency procedure have more than four times the chance than other patients of having a clot ...Dole Joins Those Recalling Cantaloupes
The Associated Press - Mar 28, 2008
WASHINGTON (AP) — Dole Fresh Fruit Co. on Friday joined firms recalling Honduran cantaloupes grown, packed and shipped by an independent third-party grower, ...US fruit company recalls cantaloupes
Xinhua, China - 14 hours ago
LOS ANGELES, March 29 (Xinhua) -- The US fruit company of Dole has ordered an urgent recall of Honduran cantaloupes because of a salmonella outbreak in the ...Salmonella Cantaloupe Prompts Simply Fresh Fruit Recall
Newsinferno.com, NY - 20 hours ago
Simply Fresh Fruit of Los Angeles, California has announced a nationwide recall of select fresh cut fruit products that contain cantaloupe that may be have ...Honduras: Cantaloupe Ban Criticized
New York Times, United States - Mar 27, 2008
By MARC LACEY Officials are denouncing a Food and Drug Administration decision asking American grocers to stop selling cantaloupe imported from a Honduran ...Chiquita Recalls Whole Cantaloupes
Kansas City infoZine, MO - Mar 29, 2008
Cincinnati, OH - infoZine - Chiquita Brands International, Inc. today announced a voluntary recall of cantaloupes grown, packed and shipped by an ...Honduras applauds US inspection of melon facilities
International Herald Tribune, France - Mar 28, 2008
AP TEGUCIGALPA, Honduras: Honduran officials said Friday that they welcome a US inspection of the cantaloupe facilities that exported melons linked to ...Health Department warns of tainted cantaloupe
Rutland Herald, VT - Mar 29, 2008
AP AP AP The Vermont Department of Health is warning consumers not to eat certain cantaloupes imported from Honduras, which are suspected to be the source ...Dole To Voluntarily Recall Cantaloupes
CBS 2, CA - Mar 28, 2008
WESTLAKE VILLAGE, Calif. Dole Fresh Fruit Co. will voluntarily recall Honduran cantaloupes after reports of a salmonella outbreak in the United States and ...TM Kovacevich Recalls Cantaloupe
eMaxHealth.com, NC - Mar 27, 2008
TM Kovacevich International, Inc. of Philadelphia, PA is recalling cantaloupes which it purchased from Agropecuaria Montelibano, a Honduran grower and ...Salmonella warning issued over Honduras cantaloupes
Pacific Daily News, GU - Mar 27, 2008
The Department of Public Health and Social Services is warning consumers that about 15000 pounds of cantaloupes imported to Guam from Honduras could carry ...Salmonella Cases In 16 States From Cantaloupes
WFMY News 2, NC - Mar 27, 2008
Washington -- The Bush administration is assuring Honduran officials it will move quickly to inspect facilities in Honduras that exported cantaloupes linked ...
Voluntary Recall on Honduran Cantaloupes Due to Potential Health ...
Business Wire (press release), CA - Mar 28, 2008
WESTLAKE VILLAGE, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Dole Fresh Fruit Company, a subsidiary of Dole Food Company, Inc., has voluntarily recalled all Honduran ...Food agency expands tainted cantaloupe warning
Canada.com, Canada - Mar 27, 2008
OTTAWA — Consumers are being reminded not to eat cantaloupes from Agropecuaria Montelibano, a grower and packer in Honduras, because they may be ...Honduras: Melon alert unjust
Capital Press (subscription), OR - Mar 29, 2008
By FREDDY CUEVAS AP Copyright 2008 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. ...Cantaloupes recalled
Cay Compass, Cayman Islands - Mar 27, 2008
Imported cantaloupes from Honduras have been recalled by the US Food and Drug Administration because of salmonella contamination. ...
Dole Recalling Cantaloupes Imported From Honduras
Dog Flu Diet and Diseases, Canada - 5 hours ago
March 30 2008 - It is being reported that Dole Fresh Fruit Co has joined the list of companies who are recalling large numbers of cantaloupes over fear that ...Amid salmonella outbreak, Dole joins in recalling cantaloupes from ...
The Canadian Press, WASHINGTON - Mar 28, 2008
WASHINGTON — The Dole Fresh Fruit company has joined firms recalling Honduran cantaloupes after they were linked to a salmonella outbreak in the US and ...US Health Inspectors Sent to Honduras
The Associated Press - Mar 27, 2008
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Bush administration assured Honduran officials Thursday it would act quickly to inspect the cantaloupe growing and packing facilities ...
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A Logistics Error that Could Have Sparked WWIII
Do you remember the Cuban Missile crisis? That little situation where WWIII almost happened when the Soviet Union started shipping nuclear warheads to Cuba.
History almost repeated itself this last week based on a logistics error that took place in 2006 when a government contractor may have mistakenly shipped Nuclear warhead fuses to Taiwan. The situation is like the mirror image of the Cuban Missile crisis.
One nuclear superpower ships nuclear warheads to an island off the coast of another nuclear superpower. This time it was the US doing the shipping and China having to decide whether or not there was malevolent intent.
One of the differences however, seems to be that this time in history an contract was to blame for the mistake (or possibly scape-goated). While the 24 hours news cycles this week were busy covering Presidential Candidate verbal snafu's they failed to pick up on a logistics snafu of much greater significance.
The fact that the US as a country mistakenly sent Nuclear missile fuses to Taiwan is not at question. The how and why is definitely up for grabs and a number of lawmakers are calling for an investigation and Secretary of Defense Gates is calling for a full inventory of the Nuclear arsenal, which you would think would happen regularly anyway.
It would appear that EG&G, who acquired URS Corporation, may have been responsible for the contracts that would have included this mistaken logistics shipment.
That is a pretty significant mistake to make. Its not like shipping elliptical machines to the wrong sporting goods distribution center. Regardless we will definitely hear more about this as more facts come out during the investigation. This will likely end up on the hill in another Congressional investigation.
Related Stories to Nuclear Missile Fuses Shipped to Taiwan
Gates Orders Inventory of US Nukes
The Associated Press - Mar 27, 2008
During that time, according to a senior Taiwan defense official, the US initially asked Taiwan to dispose of the missile fuses. US officials said that early ...
AP Top News at 9:49 pm EDT The Associated Press
Air Force News, news from Iraq - Air Force Times AirForceTimes.com
US orders nuclear survey Radio Netherlands
Salt Lake Tribune - Washington Post
all 494 news articles »Utahns seek answers on missile-fuse mix-up
Deseret News, UT - 13 hours ago
Did the shipping clerk who sent the Minuteman missile fuses to Taiwan know what was in the boxes, or just mix up parts numbers? ...
Davis Beat - Work will slow traffic along I-15 Davis County Clipper
all 2 news articles »US sent missile fuses to Taiwan in error
Seattle Times, United States - Mar 26, 2008
By Josh White AP video | Defense Department sent arms to Taiwan WASHINGTON — The Defense Department mistakenly shipped nuclear-missile fuses to Taiwan more ...US mistakenly sent nuclear missile fuses to Taiwan
International Herald Tribune, France - Mar 25, 2008
By Kristin Roberts Reuters WASHINGTON: The US military mistakenly shipped four fuses for nuclear missiles to Taiwan in 2006 and never caught the error, ...US sent nuclear missile fuses to Taiwan in error
Guardian, UK - Mar 25, 2008
Officials said the fuses sent to Taiwan, which were from the 1960s, appeared to have been in a shipping container that had been sent between US air force ...US mistakenly sent nuclear missile fuses to Taiwan
Reuters - Mar 25, 2008
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The US military mistakenly shipped four fuses for nuclear missiles to Taiwan in 2006, the Pentagon said on Tuesday, adding that the ...US, Chinese leaders talk about Taiwan missile shipment
Team 4 News, TX - Mar 26, 2008
AP - March 26, 2008 4:23 PM ET WASHINGTON (AP) - President Bush has told China's president that sending nuclear missile fuses to Taiwan was a "mistake. ...
US Accidentally Ships Missile Parts to Taiwan, Accidentally Ships ... The Spoof (satire)
Bush calls fuse delivery a mistake Boston Globe
US accidentally delivered nuclear missile components to Taiwan Men's News Daily
all 250 news articles »Taiwan says did not dismantle US missile parts
Reuters - Mar 26, 2008
The US military was supposed to ship helicopter batteries to Taiwan, but instead sent fuses used as part of the trigger mechanism on Minuteman missiles, ...Hits and Misses
Dallas Morning News, TX - 12 hours ago
It boggles the mind that someone could mistakenly send four Minuteman nuclear-missile fuses to Taiwan instead of the spare helicopter batteries Taiwan had ...US told Taiwan 'dump missile fuses'
MWC News, Canada - Mar 26, 2008
Four of the cone-shaped fuses were sent to Taiwan in late 2006 instead of helicopter batteries that had been ordered. The 55cm-long fuses, which reportedly ...
Cargill Faces New Type of Fire, Fire
Cargill Inc. has definitely had a crash course in serious fire drills. First, they had to deal with one of the largest meat recalls in US history.
This weekend they had to deal with a fire of a different nature. A literal fire in an Arkansas meat packing plant that had just completed an expansion appears to have devastated the plant.
Workers were welding fans in the plant. Their work had been completed and tools put away and something ignited and triggered a fire that destroyed the plant.
The company is not the only one to be negatively impacted by this recent fire. The town where the plant was located is likely to see most of its 4,000 employees laid off and pushed to the unemployment line losing health insurance, benefits, travel health insurance and much more. The meat packing plant was one of the only economic lifelines for the small town.
Just-in-Time is Just Breaking Under $4 / Gallon Diesel - $110 / Barrel Oil
Diesel Fuel prices have been hitting over $4 per gallon across the United States this month and the average is almost there nation wide. The last increases in Diesel prices have created a new trend in over land freight shipments.
Freight Shipments are stopping.
Thousands of loads are going unfilled now. Trucking firms and independent operators alike can no longer afford to ship freight loads that pay less than $2 per mile.
The problem is that many companies have agreements and contracts that lock freight rates at a percentage of sales or at fixed amounts. They do not have the flexibility to raise their freight rate offers because they do not have the flexibility to pass on higher prices to their own customers.
That means that freight is not moving. Thousands of loads are starting to back up around the country at this point and many trucks are coming off the road or only taking the loads that will pay rates that keep their trucks filled up with diesel.
Contractual locks on prices by companies such as Wal-Mart, Lowes, the Home Depot, Office Depot, Kroger, Walgreens and many others have pushed freight firms and their suppliers into a corner where the goods can not ship profitably and that means they do not ship at all in some cases.
If fuel prices continue to rise, freight back ups are going to increase, suppliers will be forced to limit operations or renegotiate with their massive retail customers. Retailers will be forced to pay higher prices and in turn they will be forced to eat that cost in their profits or pass the price increase on to consumers.
Wal-Mart used increasing prices in core consumer products as a marketing tool. Wal-Mart kept prices from increasing by as much as 30% in an attempt to take customers away from competitors like target, essentially buying market share. Wal-Mart's competitors can not afford to keep up with single handed attempts to limit inflation and Wal-Mart can not keep it up forever either.
People might forego buying Orovo from Walgreens for a few months, but what happens when milk, bottled water or god forbid a new flat screen TV doesn't show up on the shelves on time.
Huntington, IN Loses Jobs to Brookeville, OH
As if to prove a point in our last article, this article demonstrates that distribution centers rarely stay open more than ten years. Huntington, Indiana is looking at losing 140 jobs when a 400,000 + square foot distribution center closes down a year from now to be replaced by a new distribution center in Ohio that will be 600,000 square feet.
Huntington will lose a major employer in spring 2009 when Collective Brands Inc. closes its 140-employee distribution center as part of a company consolidation, the Fort Wayne Journal Gazette reports today.
The Topeka, Kan.-based company, which owns Payless ShoeSource and The Stride Rite Corp., plans to close the distribution centers in Huntington and Burnaby, British Columbia.
The work will go to the footwear company’s 600,000-square-foot Eastern Distribution Center in Brookville, Ohio, which is under construction.
We're not making a judgment call on this one way or the other, but states, counties and cities have been pitted in a collective race to the bottom for some years to make their areas more attractive for business and their tax rebates and other forms of public funding are rarely returned to the local economies that support them.
It makes good local headlines to bring jobs to an area, but in many cases the jurisdictions are paying entirely for those jobs at ridiculous prices. This happens from public sector warehousing jobs, to government jobs with the USPS to silicon valley jobs making Linksys router s to biotech and education and more. Its predominant in the US economy today and a large part of the reason, many governments are busting their budgets left and right.
The Allen Group Looking at Sweet Heart Tax Abatement in Kansas
If you have a new distribution center being installed and you are not in Kansas, then you may not be too happy. The Allen Group doesn't have this problem as they are looking at getting a 10 year abatement of 85% on property taxes for their future 12 million square foot facility.
The Gardner City Council has endorsed an extraordinary property tax abatement for a proposed logistics hub that could be built next to an intermodal distribution center BNSF Railway Co. is building in the city.
Property taxes on the proposed hub's development by The Allen Group would be cut by 85 percent for 10 years. The city's usual abatement is 50 percent for 10 years.
The Allen Group projects building as much as 12 million square feet of warehouses.
That's a sweet heart of a deal, especially if you consider the average life expectancy on a distribution center is less than 10 years. That means that The Allen Group may never have to pay a full rate of property taxes before they build again.
If fighting cancer was as easy as getting tax breaks for building distribution centers, we'd have been cancer free decades ago instead of puttering around with antioxidant supplements and other procedures.
Nine Inch Nails makes $1.6 million first week with New Music Model
Last week we reported that the music group Nine Inch Nails had severed its relationships with record companies and ventured out onto the internet in a solo bid to sell music directly to fans, even offering up 9 tracks from its 4 CD set completely free. The full 36 tracks can be purchased and downloaded for $5 and there are many more configurations as well ranging from $10 to $300.
Well the marketing effort and distribution model have been a big success. During the first week of sales they have sold 800,000 downloads and made $1.6 million in revenue. Those sales do not need to be shared with a record company and that opens the door for a lot of profits.
Music Industry Dies a Little this Month with a Nine Inch Nail
They are next going to kick off a fan inspired music video / film festival allowing their fans access to the tracks to mix their own music and films for a YouTube contest and event. It already has brought about a great deal of publicity and generated lots of interest. The price is right Free teasers and $5 for the entire album and more for extras. Plus they are even encouraging fans to share copies amongst themselves for free. All the tracks are DRM free, meaning that sharing them is perfectly legal.
Critics point out that the band is already famous and has a strong fan base. This might be more difficult to achieve with an unknown band such as Chanel J12, but does show that the distribution model is viable for existing bands.
Cost Savings - Not the Driver for Warehouse Management Systems
Recently the Supply Chain Digest covered a number of the drivers that lead companies to implement new warehouse management systems. Surprisingly one of the factors that typically does not drive a new implementation of a WMS system is a desire to bring costs down.
Warehouse management systems are often times implemented for other reasons and other problems that need solutions such as dealing with rapid company growth, replacing obsolete technology, reconfiguring business to meet new supply chain and logistics strategies, and even regulatory changes.
Reducing costs is a driver but it's definitely not the most significant driver that lead companies to choose a new warehouse management system. Often times in fact cost savings are an unexpected side benefit to these implementations. On the downside many companies walk into these projects with unrealistic concepts of what they need to achieve and often times they provide too few resources to deal with the changeover. This can often tightly to scope creep or increased implementation costs.
That actually unfortunately makes common sense as a company that does something because they have to as opposed to a company that does something because they want to his likely making the change for some of the wrong reasons. Over time they probably can work it out and benefit from the change, but embracing a project as opposed to paying lip service to it is rarely a good business strategy and hardly ever leads to the cost savings that could be achieved.
All too often these and other IT related projects are treated like red tape step children with a level of importance about a half step down from investigating medicare part d rates after retirement. A company might spend hundreds of thousands of dollars, even millions but fail to staff the project for success. This is rarely the way to invest in a new solution that will become the life blood of the company.
The New Revolution in Music Distribution Staged by Artists
For years the music has been under assault from its customers trying to find cheap to free ways to get its products. In the early years, many artists were behind the industry. Notably bands like Metallica went to Congress and testified that music downloading was bad and wrong and theft even.
But after almost a decade record sales falling in a downward spiral, and many artists getting worked over themselves by the music industry, bands are starting to revolt. One of those bands, Nine Inch Nails may have started to crack the code of going solo, without a music distributor and record company.
Last year they started running stealth campaigns leaving USB drives around their concerts with copies of their new albums and other tracks. Now they are offering up very high quality music on their website at prices that range from free to $300.
Fans can get many different tracks and can get the music in many formats from digital downloads to vinyl records, CD's, DVD's and even $300 autographed DVD editions and album information available in PDF books.
Their servers are literally running to the breaking point. They are definitely moving copies, the new question might be one of paying for the bandwidth with the proceeds.
Nine Inch Nails cracks net distribution (maybe) | The Register
Lewiston Wal-Mart Roof Collapse
You may not be able to catch this on the news this morning with all the election talk. A 1 million square foot Wal-Mart distribution center in Lewiston Maine collapsed in the refrigeration section.
Engineers are assessing the damage to the Wal-Mart Distribution Center in Lewiston following the collapse of a section of the roof.
No injuries were reported from the cave-in, which took place around 8:30 Tuesday night. The collapse apparently was in an area of the complex that contains refrigeration equipment.
This was not a total collapse of the roof and no injuries are reported yet. The larger issue that Wal-Mart will need to determine is whether or not the rest of this facility might be at risk.
There is no information on whether or not this could have been caused by snow, water, structural issues, an industrial accident or something else.
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