Bruce Murrie, every mention

Mars Inc. - The Chocolate Story (Audio) · Acquired Dec 16, 2024 · 21 mentions

• ▶ 1:57:24 David Rosenthal So Forrest and William Murray work out a deal to start a new joint venture candy company that will be 80% owned by Forrest and 20% owned by Murray's son, Bruce.
• ▶ 1:59:03 Ben Gilbert Do you know what else Bruce Marie had access to?
• ▶ 2:00:49 David Rosenthal So, Murray agrees to this, and in the spring of 1940, Forrest and Bruce Murray, the son, set up M&M Limited as a partnership.
• ▶ 2:02:30 David Rosenthal Because of course, it's Bruce Murray's company.
• ▶ 2:02:37 David Rosenthal 20% of it is Bruce Murray's company.
• ▶ 2:03:10 David Rosenthal Bruce gets to tag right along, and as head of sales in the new M&M Limited Partnership, he is perfectly positioned to do that.
• ▶ 2:08:29 David Rosenthal After the war, Forrest and Bruce Murray, of course, now need to find new customers for M&Ms.
• ▶ 2:09:23 David Rosenthal This, of course, as you would imagine, creates quite a lot of tension between Forrest and Bruce, especially because Bruce was in charge of sales.
• ▶ 2:09:33 David Rosenthal And Bruce had been great at sales when he's selling to the military,
• ▶ 2:09:38 David Rosenthal So did you hear about what supposedly Forrest did to Bruce here?
• ▶ 2:09:45 David Rosenthal So the story is, as sales are not going well, Forrest orders Bruce to produce a daily report of the past day's sales of M&Ms in a written form to him every morning in the office.
• ▶ 2:10:26 Ben Gilbert Is he trying to get Bruce to leave the company at this point, or is he just trying to motivate him?
• ▶ 2:10:46 David Rosenthal He's trying to get Bruce to leave the company.
• ▶ 2:10:53 David Rosenthal So in 1949, four years after the end of the war and middling sales at best of M&Ms, Forrest finally succeeds in pushing Bruce out.
• ▶ 2:11:04 David Rosenthal And supposedly it comes down to a confrontation one day where Bruce is like, I can't take it anymore with Forrest, how you're treating me, you know, posting these reports in the men's bathroom.
• ▶ 2:11:19 David Rosenthal Forrest kicks Bruce out of the plant as, you know, security or whatever, come and take him out.
• ▶ 2:11:31 David Rosenthal So Bruce resigns, and then once Bruce resigns, after this, this starts the negotiations of Forrest buying out his 20% stake.
• ▶ 2:11:45 David Rosenthal So they're valuing the M&M's business at five million dollars, which, you know, this is 1949, so if you adjust for inflation in 2024 dollars, that would be like valuing the business at sixty five million and buying Bruce out for thirteen…
• ▶ 2:12:02 David Rosenthal So, you know, thirteen million dollar payout, you know, in today's dollars for Bruce to walk away.
• ▶ 2:12:35 David Rosenthal As soon as Forrest completes the purchase and kicks Bruce out of the company, takes a hundred percent ownership, he goes in 1950 and hires the ad agency Ted Bates and Company
• ▶ 2:23:07 David Rosenthal And probably also knowing Forrest was strategic when he chose to push Bruce out of the business, because I believe William Murray had already retired from Hershey's at that point.