Business memo 09/24/01

Dinner, golf tournament part of industry weekThe annual Industrial Dinner, featuring the award honoring the 2001 Industry of the Year, will be held Oct. 3 at the Show Me Center. The Industrial Appreciation Golf Tournament will be held Oct. 1 at the Cape Girardeau Country Club.

It's all part of Industrial Appreciation Week in Cape Girardeau.

Carl E. Hurley, a former educator who left a professorship at Eastern Kentucky University to become a full-time speaker and entertainer, will be featured speaker at the dinner.

"The dinner is designed to honor area industries," said John Mehner, president of the Cape Girardeau Chamber of Commerce. "This year, we will honor the 2001 Industry of the Year."

More than 650 persons attend the banquet last year. Tickets for the 2001 event are now available at $30 each. Tables of eight may be reserved with company name. Tickets are available by calling the chamber at 335-3312.

Entry fee for the golf tournament is $70 per person for the four-person scramble. Last year, 144 golfers participated in the tournament. A special prize will be awarded this year for a hole-in-one on hole 16. Entries will be taken until Sept. 24.

Employment firm adds new testing center

Workforce Employment Solutions, 2520 William Street, had a crowd Friday.

Workforce Inc., a full-service, regional employment firm with offices in Farmington, Perryville, St. Genevieve, Sikeston and Cape Girardeau, held a day-long open house to introduce its new Wonderlic Testing Center.

Wonderlic offers a personality profile evaluation and is located just inside the Workforce Employment Solutions building.

College buys new freightliner for program

Shawnee Community College (SCC) recently bought a 1997 freightliner with a walk-in condo-sleeper for the SCC Truck Driving training program.

The freightliner was purchased with funds from a $35,000 Rural Business Enterprise Grant from the USDA Rural Development Agency. The grant will also provide for purchase of a new flatbed trailer.

The SCC Truck Driving program has three tractor-trailer trucks, and presents eight-week truck-driving courses.

Drop in grocery earnings smaller than expected

Grocery retailer and wholesaler Supervalu Inc. has reported a smaller-than-expected drop in second-quarter earnings, as sales declined.

The Minneapolis-based company said it earned $52.1 million, or 39 cents per share, for the quarter ended Sept. 8. That compared with earnings of $57.3 million, or 43 cents per share in the year-ago quarter.

Analysts' estimates ranged from 35 to 37 cents, with a mean estimate of 36 cents, according to data tracking firm Thomson Financial/First Call. Sales for the quarter fell to $4.7 billion from $5.3 billion a year earlier. Supervalu said sales reflected the cessation of supply services to discount retailer Kmart Corp (KM.N). Looking ahead, Supervalu tightened the range of its fiscal 2002 earnings per share forecast to $1.75 to $1.80, from a previous range of $1.70-$1.80. Its preliminary earnings per share outlook for fiscal 2003 is $1.85 to $2.

Supervalu operated a facility at Scott City, until last year, when the Supervalu Distribution Center closed putting 160 people out of jobs. The center had opened in Scott City in 1962.

Three new businesses open in Scott City

Three new businesses have opened in Scott City -- Scott City Medical Clinic, Soups and Sweet's and Dewitt Insurance.

The three businesses account for 6,600 square feet, says Tom Kelsey, a commercial real estate broker who handles the leasing.

Dr. J. W. Campbell and Dr. Thymios Lambrou are among physicians at the new medical clinic. The space has been completely refurbished and redecorated.

Soups and Sweets is the newest restaurant in the town, locating in the former Southeast Missouri Port authority space in the plaza. The restaurant is owned by the Moyers family, which will operate a full-service, sit-down restaurant, specializing in home-cooked meals and desserts.

Barbara Curnell is the authorized agent for Dewitt Insurance of Scott City. Curnell was previously associated with Farmers Insurance group. She will be working with a number of insurance carriers

Scott City Plaza is owned by Rhodes Real Estate Partners and now has a total of nine businesses there.

In addition to the three new openings, other businesses include the IGA Foodliner, Dollar General Store, Movie Max Video, the Riverside Regional Library, H & R Block, and Rhodes 101 Convenience Store.

Anheuser-Busch plans to expand brewery

Anheuser-Busch Inc. plans a three-year expansion of its Colorado brewery that will increase capacity by 50 percent and add 35 jobs.

The expansion was announced Wednesday. The Fort Collins brewery, which opened in 1988, now produces 6.4 million barrels of beer annually for distribution in 13 Western states.

The project will increase capacity to 9.6 million barrels by 2004, plant manager Glenn Wilson said.

Anheuser-Busch has 700 employees and an annual payroll of $43 million in Fort Collins. The average salary of a production worker, including overtime, is about $66,000, Wilson said.

The St. Louis-based company holds an estimated 49 percent of the domestic beer market and had sales of more than $12.3 billion last year.

The company did not disclose the cost of the Fort Collins expansion. It will include a new brew house, brewing equipment and a 100,000-square-foot warehouse.

-- From staff, wire reports