Improvise the Entire Machine Then Scale It

"Foods because no one else knew how to build and operate a frozen food processing plant. He went to work improvising, sketching plans on the back of cigarette packages, thinking how the production process would work, and designing new machinery. Wallace explained that Pierson “had it all in his head,” never one to outline elaborate plans, preferring to solve problems on the spot.18 Harrison and Wallace were dependent on Pierson’s work. Once Pierson had put together plans for the plant, Wallace took his"

"off other machines like bullets.” Harrison and his brother Bob had made notes of the machines and freezers in use when they visited the plant in Maine. The problem was that money was short, so the McCains searched for machines that they could get second-hand. They were able, for example, to buy freez- ing equipment from a Quebec firm. They also acquired second-hand boilers from a plant in Ontario and machines to cut potatoes from California. They bought new machines only when they had no choice. Pierson went over the machines as they arrived and adapted them, when necessary, to operate a frozen french fries line.21 Since many of the machines had to be modified, they often had to be"

"But growing potatoes and producing frozen french fries are two vastly different things. The risks were high, knowledge of the sector was virtually non- existent, and Carleton County had no expertise in building, let alone managing a frozen food plant. Youth, energy, and raw ambition were about to come face-to-face with a daunting challenge in an environ- ment that provided little help. Reading about the early months at McCain Foods essentially speaks to an exercise in improvisation, of attempts at trying this and that to see what would work. First on the agenda was to find a site for the plant. Second was to build it. Third was to acquire the machinery and make it work. Fourth, hire staff. Fifth, make the freezing process work and ensure quality. Sixth, identify and pursue markets. All in all, a daunting agenda for two men still in their twenties, with no experi- ence in the sector."

"this mantra time and time again whenever the question was broached. As for expertise, Harrison and Wallace once again got lucky when they learned that a pioneer in the business was living just down the road from them, working for H.C. Baxter in Houlton, Maine. Olof Pierson would earn the label “the father of the frozen French fried potato.”16 Pierson was an eccentric, MIT-trained, chain-smoking, hard- drinking, absent-minded inventor. He earned a master’s degree in aeronautical engineering from MIT in 1932, and while serving in the American army during the Second World War he was given the task of working out how to dehydrate potatoes for the armed services. His success led to his joining H.C. Baxter, where he continued his work on processing potatoes, first in canned goods and later in freezing them as french fries. He invented and drove the process and indeed was dir- ectly responsible for the first package of frozen french fries sold in 1947 by the Birds Eye Company.17 He later became an independent consult- ant in the frozen food business. McCain Foods was an early client, and later he advised the United Nations Food Organization. Pierson had the run of the place on the technical side with McCain"