Business-secret with the price of NOK 25.90. (About £2).

BUSINESS-SECRET WITH THE PRICE OF NOK 25.90. (About £2).

(Article translated from the online version of the Norwegian newspaper Dagbladet.,
published Sunday 28/12/1997).

Orkla Foods is been secretive about where it is, that the basic ingredients,
to the Pizza Grandiosa is from. Orkla don't wont to provide information regarding
eighter the orginiating country or supplier for the basic ingredients.
They refuse to answer questions regarding the meat in the Grandiosa. And when
Dagbladet visited the pizza-factory in Stranda, the restrictions, on what
Dagbladet was allowed to view, were particularely tight. - Business-secrets,
Information Director in Orkla Foods, Håkon Mageli says.


Orginial article written by Lajla Ellingsen.

It's not about pizza. It's about that pizza. The one that all the Norse loves,
according to Stabburet, or like Information Director in Stabburet, Håkon Mageli,
says: 'It tastes bloody good'. And then it's natrual to ask. What is it really,
that we're eating so much of? What is a Pizza Grandiosa? - It says on the box,
the Information Director answers. With the Information Director brought with us,
we are heading towards Stranda, the pizza paradise, where Orkla Foods recently
have investigated in a new factory to the price of 200.000.000 NOK. Where it
this day, is being produced 180 000 pizzas. And from new year, the capacity is
being increased by fifty percent. - It not really everything that is being said
on the box, Meat from large cattle (storfekjøtt), it can mean anything from cow
to horse, can't it?

- It's not horse in the Grandiosa, Madam! Hageli thunders, but he admit that it
is a mixture. From cow or bull.

- Which looks like real meat?

- It's now simple task to make well tasting pizza-meat. The taste is the most
important to us. If it doesn't taste good, then the consumer isn't going to
buy the pizza.

- But you can't claim that it's a coincident, that the way you mix and cut the
mixture, makes it look like real meat?

- Claim and claim. It is meat from big cattle (storfekjøtt) in the meat. But you'll
never get my recipy, due to competitiveabilty-reasons.

NAIVE BEYOND LIMITS

It was here that it started. Two weeks ago. When we wanted to go behind the ingredients-
list on the famous yellow and red pizza-boxes. Like what type of meat that was being
used. - what piece of the cattle are we eating when we are eating Grandiosa? Or if
we could be sure of that the soy-protein, being used to bind the meat, isn't gene-
modified. What about the tomatoo-puree? We wished to trace the ingredients back to
the producer. And we wondered what we really could get for 25.90 NOK. And we got
answered:

- Eg. Jarslberg-cheese, produced by 'Norske Meierier'. (Translates to Norwegian Dairys,
the Norwegian Dairy monopoly).

- What about the soy-protein?

- We are not supplying information about the supplier of the soy-protein.

- But how can we know that it isn't gene-modified then?

- Because we have got a garanty from our supplier. We have a policy on that we shouldn't
use gene-modified products. The consumer can be reasured about this.

- But the consumer is without any possibilities to double-check this?

- We can't reveal who our suppliers are. It would be naive beyond any limits. We protect
what we have. You'll never get my recipy.

The Information Director said. But we got an appointment to see the production. In 14 days.

AS FEW ANSWERS

He's Mr. Grandiosa. The Factory Manager in white, Ivar Moss, the entrepenour who blinks in
a clever way every time he nods, and who is enjoying the self-rolled un-filtered tobacco-
sigarette, when the young, dark Information Director, is laying transparent-documents on
the overhead-projector, and is telling about market-shares, and business-strategies. And
about food-safety. And from new year, it's going to be a free of charge landline number,
so that everyone can call if they are having any questions about the pizzas.

- And then they'll get as few answers as us?

- I think you have gotten very good answers. There are some things we can't say.

- But it's emerging a stronger and stronger demand from consumers, to know more about the
production-process and origination?

- I wont say how wer are going to provide information in the future. We'll have to look
at this, Mageli says, and then it's Mr. Grandiosa's turn. He who was called up by Leif
Frode onarheim, more than twenty years ago, with the question if he could producy pizzas
at Stranda. Of course we can, Moss answered, hang up the phone, turned in bed, poked his
wife, and asked: 'What's pizza'? He didn't know then, but the young people know, who
in the seventies revolutionised the eating habbits in the home, with home-made pizza.
After the revolution, pizza became a factory-produced product, eaten by everyone, and
which fitted well in a country, where one have to get by with a packed lunch, instead of
a hot lunch. And where the hunger demands the food to be put on the table, as soon as
one enters the door to ones home. Then the answer is, more often than in any other
country, frozen pizza. Or like social-antropolog and researcher on 'Statens Institutt
for Forbruksforskning' (The Governments Institute for Consumer Research), Mariann Lien,
says it:

- The Grandiosa explains the pressure we are living under. It might be looked at as a
symbol of the development in the home. (Or it really says at the home-front).

- So the Grandiosa is the price were paying for womens liberation?

- Price and price. I think it's a totally alright meal. But it's a good point, Lien says.

Ivar Moss turns around. He's going to show us the factory, which he himself has been part
of constructing. But what we get to see, is the production of the pizza-bread. And the
packaging of the finished product. Thats it.

- I'd love to let you join me in the shower, but you'll never get to the topping-department.
We have stright hygienical restrictions, and it's also top secret. We have many competitors.

THEN WE DISAGREE

So this is how it turned out that we only got to see about 1.5 kilometers of the 3.5 kilo-
meter long production-line. And we get to know that the conserving-agent, the salt, the spice,
the hardener, and the tomato-puree, are imported from abroad. While tha meat, the cheese,
the milk-protein, the yeest, and the flour are domesticly produced. The soy-protein have
recently been switched to gelatine. Because the supplier, on a long term, couldn't garantee,
suficient quantities of non gene-maniupalet soy. We don't get to know anything more. And the
Information Manager is present, to make sure that nothing more than what the higher management
have decided, is being told.

- But what quality can the basic ingridients have, with so low prices on the ready product, an in
a market, like the Norwegian, where the food-shop-chains, and not the suppliers, are in control?

- Good. We have to have good basic ingridients, we have well developed systems who ensures the
level of the quality. Eg. we have our own veterinerian, Håkon Mageli says.

- BUt the meat, how much meat is it really in it?

- You won't accept no for an answer?

- No?

- Then we disagree. We'll not tell anything more about the meat-case.

The yellow signs warnes people that aren't clearified/related. Ivar Moss opens the door.

- Then I'll walk in front, and you behind, Håkon, so that we have everything under control.

http://www.dagbladet.no/nyheter/1997/12/28/48643.html