IJMC - Chocoholics Throughout the World Mourn

A sad day. I think I'll go buy a Twix or some M&M's to commemorate this 
man's life. You should be able to develop something as he did and remain 
mostly private. I'm glad he was able to, and I'm pleased to be able to 
toast his life. I'll try not to smudge the chocolate on my cheek.  -dave







                              New York Times
                           July 3, 1999 Saturday
                    Candy Maker Forrest Mars Dies At 95

New York Times News Service via Dow Jones

By CONSTANCE L. HAYS
c.1999 N.Y. Times News Service

   Forrest Mars Sr., creator of the M&M, died Thursday at his home in
Miami. He was 95 years old. 

   In a final nod to Mars' lifelong desire for secrecy, a spokeswoman for
his company, Mars Inc., refused to provide details Friday. 

   While Mars ardently sought to avoid the limelight, he routinely ended
up on lists of the wealthiest Americans. The company he built, and turned
over in 1973 to his sons, now sells some $20 billion worth of candy,
snacks and pet food annually, according to Joel Glenn Brenner, author of
``Emperors of Chocolate,'' which was published earlier this year and
chronicles Mars' life. Along with M&M's, Milky Way, Snickers, Three
Musketeers and Skittles, the company, based in McLean, Va., owns the
Combos, Kudos and Twix brands; Uncle Ben's rice, and Kal-Kan and Pedigree
pet food. 

   Mars was often called a recluse, an eccentric or worse. When Fortune
magazine named him to its Business Hall of Fame in 1984, it praised him as
``one of this century's most brilliant and successful entrepreneurs,'' and
derided him as ``an irascible candy maker with a fetish for privacy'' and
``a driven personality given to terrifying outbursts of temper.''

   Mars did not respond.

   Born in 1904, he inherited the privately held company from his father,
Frank, who developed the Milky Way candy bar in the 1920s and quickly had
a hit on his hands. Forrest Mars, however, is credited with suggesting
some ingredients for the candy. 

   The two ended up squabbling, and Forrest Mars went to England, where he
marketed the Milky Way with some variations in the formula. During World
War II, he returned to the United States and introduced a candy-coated
chocolate that he named M&M's, based on a popular European product. 

   In 1964, he merged his company, known as Food Manufacturers, which was
responsible for, among other things, the invention of Uncle Ben's
converted rice, with Mars Inc. Fortune reported that at his first formal
meeting with Mars executives, he announced that he was a religious man and
then dropped to his knees, intoning, ``I pray for Milky Way; I pray for
Snickers.''

   Mars, who in 1922 had declared a goal of making his father's
already-successful candy company a global powerhouse, ran Mars with a
system of clear penalties and rewards. Employees were to keep their
desktops neat and clean; he once hurled a basket of papers off a senior
executive's desk, Ms.  Brenner said. 

   Managers who failed to meet growth and profit targets were dismissed.
To this day, employees who arrive on time all week qualify for a 10
percent bonus in their paychecks, while those who arrive late are docked
10 percent. Everyone, from the executive suite on down, punches a time
clock. 

   ``He was legendary for his extreme temper, and his fanatical
behavior,'' Ms.  Brenner said in an interview. 

   That temper and that behavior could be exhibited upon the discovery of
a less than perfect Mars product. ``He would call up sales associates in
the middle of the night if he found a packet of M&M's where the `M' wasn't
printed exactly in the middle of the candy, and he would order the candy
recalled,'' Ms. Brenner said. 

   Mars is also credited with coming up with a processing method for rice
that extended its shelf life, simplified its cooking and increased its
nutritional value. He marketed the rice as Uncle Ben's. At one point he
decided that people could be persuaded to buy food specially processed for
their pets, Ms. Brenner said, and thus created the pet food category. 

   His inspiration for M&M's was a lentil-shaped, candy-coated chocolate
that he saw soldiers eating while on a visit behind the lines during the
Spanish Civil War. He was traveling with a member of the Rowntree family,
Ms. Brenner said, and Rowntree went on to make Smarties, a candy similar
to M&M's. 

   The name came about because, with World War II under way and America's
involvement only a matter of time, Mars felt he needed help with the
product, especially if sugar and chocolate were to be rationed. So he
approached William F.R. Murrie, then the president of Hershey, and they
agreed to become partners.  Hence the M&M stands for ``Mars and Murrie,''
according to Ms. Brenner. Today, Hershey and Mars are archrivals in the
American candy market. 

   Although he officially retired in 1973, and began unaffiliated
businesses selling boxes of chocolates and plant food, among other things,
he continued to look in on the business and to call his sons on the carpet
for any problems he detected; until recently the sons were co-presidents
of the company. This, too, could lead to extreme behavior. 

   ``He has continued to call and harass them when he saw things that were
not to his liking,'' Ms. Brenner said. When the company's performance in
1992 disappointed him, she said, he arranged a meeting with the chairman
of Nestle SA to orchestrate a buyout. 

   A series of trusts that control the ownership of the company prevented
his three children from selling the company until his death, Ms. Brenner
said. Now, she added, the company may well go public. 

   His survivors include his sons, Forrest Jr., who, Ms. Brenner said,
stepped down as co-president in April, and John, who remains president;
his daughter, Jacqueline Mars Vogel, and 10 grandchildren. His wife,
Audrey, died in 1989. 

   03:25 EDT   JULY  3, 1999

NYT-07-02-99 2255EDT
 NYTviaNewsEDGE
Copyright (c) 1999 The New York Times Co.
Received via NewsEDGE from Desktop Data, Inc.: 07/03/99 03:23:54