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August 11, 2004

Parmalat refuses claims, files suits against banks...Weight Watchers licensing meltdown...Glanbia Foods to change wastewater disposal methods...Start-up fortified frozen dessert gains distribution...Dairy People News...Supermarkets, unions reach agreements on two coasts...Albertsons to convert seven stores to discount format...Randalls founder suffers fatal heart attack...Odds-and-Ends...Stock Market Ticker...More news at www.idfa.org.

DAIRY BUSINESS BRIEFS

Parmalat Finanziaria SpA is refusing to accept $1.3 billion in claims from banks including Citigroup Inc. ($657 million), Bank of America Corp. ($223 million), UBS AG ($75 million), and Deutsche Bank ($123 million). The Italian company is additionally in the process of filing various suits against banks it had dealings with for either abetting fraud or receiving payment at the expense of creditors, allegedly contributing to the collapse of the multi-national dairy company late last year. Suits include: $20 million against Deutsche Bank; $350 million against Swiss bank UBS; and $10 billion against U.S. bank Citigroup Inc., as reported in last week's D-Brief. (Associated Press; AFX News)

Litigation over a licensing agreement for Weight Watchers Smart Ones frozen desserts is underway. Weight Watchers International Inc. filed a legal claim against CoolBrands International Inc. for reportedly stockpiling Weight Watchers Smart Ones frozen desserts with the intention to sell the products after the expiration date of a licensing agreement; the $113-million contract between Weight Watchers and CoolBrands expires Sept. 28. Woodbury, N.Y.-based Weight Watchers is asking the New York State Supreme Court to prevent Toronto-based frozen dessert marketer CoolBrands from selling Smart Ones products and to award unspecified compensation, including punitive damages. CoolBrands is expected to counter-file a $360 million suit against Weight Watchers for breach of contract. CoolBrands claims the diet product company signed an agreement with another distributor (Wells' Dairy) while under contract with the Canadian firm (Bloomberg News; CoolBrands report; National Post's Financial Post & FP Investing, Canada)

Glanbia Foods Inc. will change wastewater disposal methods at its southern Idaho cheese plant under a proposed agreement, subject to state regulatory approval, between the company and its neighbors in Gooding, Idaho. Buffers of 1,000 feet between the fields where wastewater is spread and neighboring property will be created under the agreement. Glanbia also plans to build a wastewater treatment plant to process wastewater prior to field spreading as well as to test for health-threatening micro-organisms. If approved by regulators, the agreement could be used to impose the same standards on other dairy operations in the state. (Associated Press)

A lowfat, vitamin-fortified ice cream bar dubbed Worthies Healthy Ice Cream from start-up Fussworthy Foods has racked up $50,000 in sales so far and continues to grow. Developed in Texas by Ronica Tucker and Heather Boyett, the product is co-packed by Perry's Ice Cream Co. in Akron, N.Y. The two founders are Boeing employees who conducted R&D in their home kitchens. The Worthies line is currently distributed in the Southeast and New York state via foodservice distributorship. In addition, H.E. Butt Grocery Co. began carrying the products this summer, talks are underway with other retailers including Albertsons, Wal-Mart, Costco, Publix and Winn-Dixie and 7-Eleven convenience stores are also testing the products. (San Antonio Express-News)

DAIRY PEOPLE NEWS

Walter Bradley, New Mexico's lieutenant governor from 1995 to 2002, joined Dairy Farmers of America Inc. as director of government and industry relations for DFA's southwest region (New Mexico, Texas, Oklahoma and Kansas). He resigned his position as the assistant state land commissioner for New Mexico in late June to work for the Kansas City, Mo.-based co-op. (Albuquerque Journal, New Mexico)

Betsy Watson was recently promoted to marketing director at Des Moines, Iowa-based Anderson Erickson Dairy Co. (Company report)

Michael Brandt joins Skowhegan, Maine-based Gifford's Ice Cream as the director of sales and marketing. (Company report)

CUSTOMER CLIPS

Union Negotiations: After four months of negotiations, Seattle-area retailers and the United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) and Teamsters unions reached a tentative contract agreement over the weekend. The previous contract expired three months ago for UFCW's 14,000 workers with Safeway, Albertsons, and Kroger-owned QFC and Fred Meyer stores. The date for the ratification vote has not yet been set. The agreement is expected to be a model for a contract with 11,000 western Washington grocery employees, whose contract expires later this year. (The Seattle Times)...Meanwhile, on the opposite coast, a strike was averted when 5,600 UFCW workers at Shaw's Supermarket stores in Massachusetts and Rhode Island and 350 more employees at its distribution center in Wells, Maine, ratified contracts. Contract negotiations between the Albertsons division and the union began in June. (Associated Press)

Boise, Idaho-based Albertsons will convert five stores in Dallas and two in Baton Rouge, La., to its Super Saver banner. The stores will be operated by the Albertsons' discount subsidiary Extreme Inc. (Associated Press)

Robert Onstead, 73, founder and longtime chairman of Texas-based Randalls Food Markets, died last week of a heart attack while on a family vacation in Italy. He was 13 when he began working at his uncle's corner grocery store and later founded his own supermarket chain. (The Houston Chronicle)

IDFA NEWS

BevExpo Early Registration Deadline is August 27
Milk industry professionals have just a few more days to take advantage of early registration discounts for BevExpo, coming next month to Tampa, Fla. Hotel blocks are filling fast. Executives and managers in R&D, quality, operations, marketing, merchandising and logistics should register now—before the August 27 cut-off—for registration discounts. BevExpo, September 29-October 1, features exhibits on milk and beverage formulation, processing, packaging and marketing. IDFA, Beverage Marketing Corporation and others have compiled the most comprehensive beverage conference of the year. Specific program details are available by clicking here. To register now, click here.

ODDS-AND-ENDS

When Mayfield Dairy received word from a soldier's wife that Tennessee's National Guardsmen with the 278th Armored Cavalry Regiment training at Camp Shelby, Miss., were missing home and the taste of Mayfield dairy products, the company took it as a call to action. The Athens, Tenn.-based division of Dean Foods sent a truckload of milk, ice cream and frozen novelties to the base Friday to serve the 3,600 troops with the 278th. The soldiers were so thrilled that some did pushups for their ice cream. (Chattanooga Times Free Press, Tennessee)...U.S. Olympic swimmer Michael Phelps will sport a milk mustache in a MilkPEP ad to appear in the August 12 issue of USA Today. Other Olympians who have appeared in the campaign include Mia Hamm, Marion Jones and Andy Roddick. (MilkPEP report)... Minnesota-based International Dairy Queen Inc. is inviting its customers to bring in their favorite cow as part of a MooLatte promotion celebrating state fair season. The promotion will give away free MooLatte frozen blended coffee drinks to every person who brings a live, four-hoofed bovine friend to a participating Dairy Queen or DQ Grill & Chill location on Aug. 24th. (Company report)

STOCK MARKET TICKER

As of 8/10/04, market close.

Company/Symbol		Last Trade		Change over Previous Close		Change over Last Week's D-brief
ConAgra Foods/CAG Dean Foods/DF Dreyer's/DRYR General Mills/GIS Groupe Danone/DA Hershey Foods/HSY Ingles Markets/IMKTA Kraft Foods/KFT Kroger/KR Ruddick Corp./RDK Safeway/SWY Saputo/SAP.TO SuperValu/SVU Unilever PLC/UL Weis Markets/WMK Wimm Bill Dann/WBD Winn-Dixie/WIN		25.90 35.56 79.40 45.24 16.20 47.24 11.25 29.56 15.31 19.56 20.97 31.45 28.11 34.80 32.57 13.26 06.00		+0.14 +0.27 -0.03 +0.18 +0.03 +0.84 +0.16 -0.09 +0.16 +0.51 +0.31 -0.18 +0.73 -0.03 +1.02 +0.48 +0.22		-0.35 -0.74 -0.05 +0.32 -0.23 -0.44 +0.18 -0.59 -0.54 -0.60 +0.19 -0.20 +0.21 -0.58 +0.65 +0.46 -0.07
Source: Yahoo! Finance

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ABOUT D-BRIEF

D-brief is written by Dairy Field magazine, a Stagnito Communications Inc. publication, www.dairyfield.com. It is provided for the benefit of the industry by the International Dairy Foods Association (IDFA), www.idfa.org.

D-brief is sponsored by Polytainers, Curwood and TIC Gums. Polytainers is a leader in the design, production and printing of thinwall rigid plastic containers for the dairy and food industries. Learn more about this sponsor at www.polytainersinc.com. Curwood develops and manufactures high-performance, high-barrier, polymer-based packaging materials. For more information about Curwood products, visit www.curwood.com. TIC Gums is America's oldest supplier of hydrocolloids to food, pharmaceutical, cosmetic and industrial companies worldwide. To learn more about this sponsor, visit www.ticgums.com.

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