Saturday, January 15, 2005
Wegmans
The legendary site of 1 PM lunches of free samples and 1 AM games of hide-and-go-seek, has been rated the number one place to work in America by Fortune.
Wegmans Food Markets, a Rochester-based grocery chain whose motto is “employees first, customers second,” topped Fortune’s eighth annual list of the best 100 companies to work for in America, the magazine said yesterday.
The 89-year old, family-owned business credited with helping pioneer “one-stop shopping,” scored high marks on employee surveys of job satisfaction and communication with management, among the biggest factors in determining the list. Runner-up was Gore-Tex fabric maker W.L. Gore of Newark, Del., followed by Republic Bancorp, a mortgage banker in Ann Arbor, Mich., biotechnology giant Genentech Inc. of South San Francisco, Calif., and Xilinx Inc., a chip maker in San Jose, Calif.
Above-average employee satisfaction has been a life-long goal, said Robert Wegman, the 86-year-old company chairman, who led the company to $3.4 billion in sales last year.
“I’ve been aiming for that for 54 years and it’s taken a long while to hit the target but I’ve finally got there,” he said. “It’s hard for me to walk through a store without customers stopping me and saying, ‘Mr. Wegman, you’ve got a great store but, wow, are your people something else.’”
At Wegmans’ 67 emporiums, 32,800 workers are paid hourly wages at the high end of the market and offered a $3 per week health insurance premium, resulting in a 6% annual turnover rate among full-time employees, compared with a 19% rate among competitors.
Jam maker J.M. Smucker Co., number six this year, topped 2004’s list. The company cut 200 jobs in November.
Celebrate here at Mandounette by sharing your favorite memories of Wegmans and/or some of your favorite Wegman's products.
I will start:
Memory: One of my earliest memories is being at Carol's Wegmans (the one on the corner of East Avenue and Winton Road, named after my first baby-sitter), sitting in the cart seat. My mom used to always let me get a cookie in the bakery at the beginning of a shopping excursion and eat it as she did her shopping. This time I was with Carol. She stopped the cart by the cookie display, while she went to the deli to order her cold cuts. I opened the glass door and took a yellow and brown happy face cookie and ate it before she came back. The next time I was at Wegmans with my mom, I noticed that she told the cashier that I had had a cookie and the cashier added the price onto the bill. It was then that I realized that I had actually stolen a cookie from Wegmans; that they weren't free. I feel guilty to this day.
Favorite product: the frosted sugar cookies that change with the holidays (I particularly fancy the St. Patrick's Day shamrock cookies) and of course their cakes with the buttercream frosting. Especially blue roses. Yum. Also, I like Dr. Woo and Moutain Woo (Wegmans brand sodas), if only for their names.
Wegmans Food Markets, a Rochester-based grocery chain whose motto is “employees first, customers second,” topped Fortune’s eighth annual list of the best 100 companies to work for in America, the magazine said yesterday.
The 89-year old, family-owned business credited with helping pioneer “one-stop shopping,” scored high marks on employee surveys of job satisfaction and communication with management, among the biggest factors in determining the list. Runner-up was Gore-Tex fabric maker W.L. Gore of Newark, Del., followed by Republic Bancorp, a mortgage banker in Ann Arbor, Mich., biotechnology giant Genentech Inc. of South San Francisco, Calif., and Xilinx Inc., a chip maker in San Jose, Calif.
Above-average employee satisfaction has been a life-long goal, said Robert Wegman, the 86-year-old company chairman, who led the company to $3.4 billion in sales last year.
“I’ve been aiming for that for 54 years and it’s taken a long while to hit the target but I’ve finally got there,” he said. “It’s hard for me to walk through a store without customers stopping me and saying, ‘Mr. Wegman, you’ve got a great store but, wow, are your people something else.’”
At Wegmans’ 67 emporiums, 32,800 workers are paid hourly wages at the high end of the market and offered a $3 per week health insurance premium, resulting in a 6% annual turnover rate among full-time employees, compared with a 19% rate among competitors.
Jam maker J.M. Smucker Co., number six this year, topped 2004’s list. The company cut 200 jobs in November.
Celebrate here at Mandounette by sharing your favorite memories of Wegmans and/or some of your favorite Wegman's products.
I will start:
Memory: One of my earliest memories is being at Carol's Wegmans (the one on the corner of East Avenue and Winton Road, named after my first baby-sitter), sitting in the cart seat. My mom used to always let me get a cookie in the bakery at the beginning of a shopping excursion and eat it as she did her shopping. This time I was with Carol. She stopped the cart by the cookie display, while she went to the deli to order her cold cuts. I opened the glass door and took a yellow and brown happy face cookie and ate it before she came back. The next time I was at Wegmans with my mom, I noticed that she told the cashier that I had had a cookie and the cashier added the price onto the bill. It was then that I realized that I had actually stolen a cookie from Wegmans; that they weren't free. I feel guilty to this day.
Favorite product: the frosted sugar cookies that change with the holidays (I particularly fancy the St. Patrick's Day shamrock cookies) and of course their cakes with the buttercream frosting. Especially blue roses. Yum. Also, I like Dr. Woo and Moutain Woo (Wegmans brand sodas), if only for their names.
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