When the first oil crisis ended France's construction boom in, Lafarge was doing business in countries. Growth opportunities in the developing world thus offset the slowdown in France. The story of Pimentos François was exactly the opposite. Originally producing Portland cement in northern France in, the company operated almost exclusively in France for the next years. The only exception was a small presence in Morocco, starting in the s. In, Comments François merged with Polite et Chiasson to become France's largest cement producer, just before the oil crisis, which reduced revenues in its main market in the Paris region by between.
The company never recovered. In, the largest Shareholder, the French bank Paribas, sold a stake in Comments François to Italcementi. Contingencies Supply-side diversification is also important. On March,, a fire
Australia Email List at a Philips factory in Albuquerque, New Mexico disrupted the global supply chain for cell phones. Gold medalist Nokia had alternative suppliers in the US and Japan who were able to come in and deliver most of the destroyed components in Albuquerque. Silver medalist Ericsson, on the other hand, had no backup vendors. In an early cost-cutting exercise, the company decided to focus on a single supplier and it paid the price.
While the Albuquerque incident did not have a negative effect on Nokia's lasting business success, it did mark the beginning of Ericsson's steady decline in mobile telephony. Principle Remember your mistakes Powerful experiences often turn into lasting stories that are passed down from generation to generation. Successful companies naturally have good stories to tell, and they tell them constantly. This practice helps motivate people and inspires them to act in ways that have produced success in the past and are likely to continue into the future. Glaxo, for example, never tires of retelling the story of Alec Nathan's successful marketing campaign for powdered milk, and the company's leaders built on that story explicitly seven decades later to launch Zantac.