By Dave Fusaro, Editor-in-Chief[email protected]
2005 will be the year of the economic recovery.There, I said it. Now you say it, and keep repeating it. Write it down. Spread the word. Good times are here. Make it your new year’s resolution. I’ve been waiting three years for the economic recovery to get here. Half the battle has been fought and won over those three years. We have cut the fat, fundamentally changed the way we do business and positioned ourselves for success in a different landscape. If you’re still reading Food Processing, you’re leaner, you’re different, you have the right plan in place.But it’s only half the battle. 2004 was a year of improvement, but it could be so much better. Now it’s time for success to catch up with us. Corporate profits were up last year. The stock market has properly revalued itself. Interest rates are still low, and so is inflation. The gross domestic product should come in around 3.75 percent for last year, and observers are calling for another 3.75-4 percent growth for this year. That’s a healthy economy in its middle stages of growth, according to most economists. So why doesn’t it feel that way? “You gotta drink the Kool-Aid,” our publisher says when he wants us all to buy into a new idea, especially a risky one. Maybe the phrase is a little dark, but what he means is it’s a state of mind; actually a state that all or most minds need to be in for the whole effort to succeed. Believing you are succeeding is the other half of the battle. So start acting like you’re a success. You’ve got to drink the Kool-Aid, too. Spend a little money and you’ll make a little more money. Soon there will be enough good times for everybody. I’ll tell you how we’ve drunk the Kool-Aid. Let me introduce you to two recent additions to our staff. David Feder is our new managing editor of Food Processing and editor of our supplement magazines Wellness Foods and Food Creation. He has a wonderful pedigree for those jobs. He’s a registered dietitian, a former chef and restaurant operator and is a dissertation away from a Ph.D. in nutrition biochemistry. And he was an editor on food-related special interest publications affiliated with Better Homes and Gardens.Heidi Parsons is our managing editor of digital media. Yes, digital media. In the past month, you should have learned what that means when you received samples of our four electronic newsletters: FoodProcessing e-news, AgilePlant Insider, WellnessFoods Insider and FoodCreation Insider. All those along with our radically different web site are Heidi’s charge. Her background includes several years on meat and poultry processing and frozen foods magazines. We’ve created something for everyone on the web. Food Processing e-news goes to everyone for whom we have an e-mail address. The other three newsletters you need to opt into. Please consider getting at least one of these newsletters a month. If you didn’t get the sample copies or you think we don’t have your e-mail address, go to www.foodprocessing.com/registration and register. Our goal for all four is to deliver information that can make your job easier or make you better for your job. Think of them as your weekly dose of continuing education. And don’t forget the web site itself. Foodprocessing.com is no longer a digital archive of this magazine but a deeply searchable compilation of magazine content, stories written specially for the web, content from other sources, white papers, products, jobs, links to other sites. Again, resources to help you do your job. As a business, we’re radically different than we were even one year ago. You probably are, too. So drink a little Kool-Aid. Let the good times begin.
2005 will be the year of the economic recovery.There, I said it. Now you say it, and keep repeating it. Write it down. Spread the word. Good times are here. Make it your new year’s resolution. I’ve been waiting three years for the economic recovery to get here. Half the battle has been fought and won over those three years. We have cut the fat, fundamentally changed the way we do business and positioned ourselves for success in a different landscape. If you’re still reading Food Processing, you’re leaner, you’re different, you have the right plan in place.But it’s only half the battle. 2004 was a year of improvement, but it could be so much better. Now it’s time for success to catch up with us. Corporate profits were up last year. The stock market has properly revalued itself. Interest rates are still low, and so is inflation. The gross domestic product should come in around 3.75 percent for last year, and observers are calling for another 3.75-4 percent growth for this year. That’s a healthy economy in its middle stages of growth, according to most economists. So why doesn’t it feel that way? “You gotta drink the Kool-Aid,” our publisher says when he wants us all to buy into a new idea, especially a risky one. Maybe the phrase is a little dark, but what he means is it’s a state of mind; actually a state that all or most minds need to be in for the whole effort to succeed. Believing you are succeeding is the other half of the battle. So start acting like you’re a success. You’ve got to drink the Kool-Aid, too. Spend a little money and you’ll make a little more money. Soon there will be enough good times for everybody. I’ll tell you how we’ve drunk the Kool-Aid. Let me introduce you to two recent additions to our staff. David Feder is our new managing editor of Food Processing and editor of our supplement magazines Wellness Foods and Food Creation. He has a wonderful pedigree for those jobs. He’s a registered dietitian, a former chef and restaurant operator and is a dissertation away from a Ph.D. in nutrition biochemistry. And he was an editor on food-related special interest publications affiliated with Better Homes and Gardens.Heidi Parsons is our managing editor of digital media. Yes, digital media. In the past month, you should have learned what that means when you received samples of our four electronic newsletters: FoodProcessing e-news, AgilePlant Insider, WellnessFoods Insider and FoodCreation Insider. All those along with our radically different web site are Heidi’s charge. Her background includes several years on meat and poultry processing and frozen foods magazines. We’ve created something for everyone on the web. Food Processing e-news goes to everyone for whom we have an e-mail address. The other three newsletters you need to opt into. Please consider getting at least one of these newsletters a month. If you didn’t get the sample copies or you think we don’t have your e-mail address, go to www.foodprocessing.com/registration and register. Our goal for all four is to deliver information that can make your job easier or make you better for your job. Think of them as your weekly dose of continuing education. And don’t forget the web site itself. Foodprocessing.com is no longer a digital archive of this magazine but a deeply searchable compilation of magazine content, stories written specially for the web, content from other sources, white papers, products, jobs, links to other sites. Again, resources to help you do your job. As a business, we’re radically different than we were even one year ago. You probably are, too. So drink a little Kool-Aid. Let the good times begin.
