Visit our Filed page for categories. To browse by specific topic, see our Inside page. For a list of companies covered on this site, visit our Companies page.
San Francisco’s board of supervisors has voted, by a veto-proof margin, to ban most of McDonald’s Happy Meals as they are now served in the restaurants.
The measure will make San Francisco the first major city in the country to forbid restaurants from offering a free toy with meals that contain more than set levels of calories, sugar and fat. Get the full story »
Kellogg Co. said Tuesday that a drop in cereal sales, intense competition and the lingering impact of some of the largest food recalls in the company’s history have made 2010 a difficult and disappointing year. Get the full story »
Late soybean seeding in Brazil due to adverse planting weather will delay the harvest in the key soybean exporting country and bolster U.S. exports of the oilseed, the vice chairman of U.S. agricultural processor Archer Daniels Midland said on Tuesday. Get the full story »
An undetermined number of McDonald’s employees at a northeastern Ohio franchise received handbills in their most recent paychecks suggesting they vote for three Republican candidates.
The fast food chain’s corporate headquarters in Oak Brook quickly condemned the action by the Canton, Ohio, restaurant, saying it was not reflective of the company’s position. Get the full story »
A group that lobbies against fast food and meat consumption will ask Mayor Richard Daley to temporarily stop fast food restaurant construction.
In a Nov. 4 letter shared with the Tribune, a director of nutrition at The Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine writes that fast food consumption leads to obesity and heart disease.
“This step is urgently needed because Chicago’s high-fat, meat-heavy diets are literally breaking hearts,” Susan Levin, the director of nutrition, writes. “A moratorium on new fast-food restaurants could be a critically important step toward fighting this epidemic.” Get the full story »
Infant formula maker Mead Johnson Nutrition Co. said Thursday its third-quarter net income climbed 9 percent compared with the same quarter last year, when retailer inventory reductions dampened its sales.
The Glenview, Ill., company earned $106.1 million, or 52 cents per share, in the three months that ended Sept. 30, up from $97.6 million, or 48 cents per share, in the same quarter last year. Adjusted earnings were 57 cents per share.
At Sara Lee’s annual meeting Thursday morning, the Downers Grove-based company offered no update on its search for a chief executive and declined to comment on the possible sale of its bread business.
The company did declare a regular quarterly dividend of $0.115 per share, up 4.5 percent, bringing the annual dividend to 46 cents. Get the full story »
Some of Fortune Brands' products. (Candice C. Cusic/Chicago Tribune)
Fortune Brands touted the “value proposition” of remaining a diversified company Thursday but said it’s open to meeting with all its investors, including hedge fund manager William Ackman’s Pershing Square Capital Management, which has taken a 10.9 percent stake in the company.
“We’re open to constructive discussion with all our shareholders and that includes Pershing Square,” Chief Executive Bruce Carbonari said. “Our board is very engaged and very involved and along, along with management, at looking at how our business is structured.”
Added Craig Omtvedt, chief financial officer, “We’re pretty relaxed. We look forward to having a dialogue with Ackman and his team as much as we do anybody else.” Get the full story »
Corn Products International Inc.’s third-quarter profit dropped 30 percent on acquisition costs, but the company reported strong volume growth across all regions and said earnings are soaring at its new specialty starches business.
The Westchester-based grain processor also raised its current-year earnings forecast to $2.75 to $2.85 a share from $2.55 to $2.75 a share, citing its strong performance. Get the full story »
The latest court quest by 10 Missouri beer consumers who tried to block InBev’s $52 billion takeover of U.S. beer giant Anheuser-Busch has fallen flat. Get the full story »
Americans love their beef, but with prices expected to remain high for the next few years and other options plentiful, their loyalities might be challenged.
Average retail prices of beef have climbed from $4.18 per pound in July 2009 to $4.44 per pound last July, a change largely due to a tight supply of cattle. Ranchers and feedlots have reduced supplies in response in large part due to rising prices of corn and soybeans fed to cattle, economists said. Get the full story »
Grupo Bimbo is the lead bidder to buy Sara Lee Corp.’s North American bread business for about $1 billion, though a deal could be several weeks away, Bloomberg News reported on Tuesday.
Sara Lee, which declined to comment, had said last month it planned to spend more on its North American bakery business and raise some prices as it looks to improve performance in that lagging business.
That announcement to invest in the business had come after some suitors walked away from the bakery auction, sources familiar with the situation previously told Reuters. Get the full story »
Panera Bread Co. reported third-quarter profit that matched analysts’ view, and shares fell 4.6 percent despite its better-than-expected profit targets for the fourth quarter and next year. Get the full story »
The Food and Drug Administration warned Mead Johnson Nutrition Co. about the packaging for some of the company’s Enfamil infant formulas.
In a letter dated Oct. 18 that was posted to the agency’s Web site Tuesday, FDA said Mead Johnson didn’t give the FDA product specifications about a new plastic tub and lid used to store certain types of powdered Enfamil. Get the full story »
