DougJ has a point when he says that most Republican candidates couldn’t run a pizza company, but let’s take a little closer look at what Cain did at Godfather’s. The chain started in the midwest in the 70’s and was sold to Pillsbury in the 80’s. Cain led it as a Pillsbury unit, took it private back in the 90’s and stepped down in 2002.
Presumably, one of the things Cain did to finance a buyout of the chain was licensing the name to Hess gas stations so an attendant who also sells gas, condoms and twinkies can keep a few reheated frozen Godfather’s pizzas sitting under a warming light for any customer desperate enough to buy one. I’m sure the private equity holders were happy when the Hess deal closed, since it “monetized the brand”, but the current state of Godfather’s isn’t anything that Dagny Taggart or Howard Roark would feel good about.
Hunter Gathers
Why are people wasting so much energy writing about Herman Cain? He has a much of a chance as I do at being POTUS and is just running in order to collect more Wingnut Welfare.
jeffreyw
They offer you a pizza you can refuse? Standards slipped they have.
WereBear
Mmm, pizza & gas fumes. The cheapest high evah!
I did like Hess. They had the cleanest bathrooms. But really, why not gush over Cain? Didn’t he make money? They are so not fussy about how that gets done.
Walker
WereBear is right. Corportists care about the short term bottom line, not long term brand management.
Jazz Superluminar
Found this excrement on Reason.com just now…
uh…yeah…that completely refudiates the principles behind the minimum wage. Fucking idiots.
Jazz Superluminar
FYWP you muthafucking asshole commenting system. You come in here, don’t even call me Godfather…
sdhays
Wait. He basically got rich because he was an executive at Pillsbury and got to be the CEO of the spun-off company?
With that kind of set up, you could run the company into the ground and walk away a millionaire, as many CEO’s do. Godfather’s certainly failed in my hometown in the 90’s (and that was before the economic collapse there really started in the early aughts).
And here I thought he had actually built that crappy pizza chain from the ground up. Though I suppose it’s still one of the more impressive resumes among Republican primary candidates.
ellie
There used to be a Godfather’s pizza in Toledo back in the late 70s, early 80s. It was really good. Then they disappeared from town and I didn’t even know they existed anymore.
Geeno
Godfather’s isn’t bad for cheap pizza, but that’s what it is, cheap pizza.
Derelict
@ellie: Same here where I live. Had one for a few years, then it disappeared. I assumed it moved to Tahoe to live on the lake with Fredo and the kids.
MattR
@Jazz Superluminar: I am shocked, shocked I tell you, that John Stossel would not include the minor detail that South Africa does not have a single minimum wage. Instead there are different values depending on the type of work and geographic area.
I’d also add that unions believing that passing this law would have that effect does not make it so. After all, the stated goal of Republican tax cuts is to stimulate job growth but I would never take those statements as proof that tax cuts actually have that result.
PurpleGirl
The current CEO of Godfather’s Pizza is named Ron Gartlan. It seems that the company is privately owned. I wonder who (which hedge fund) financed the takeover which bought out Cain.
ETA: From a couple of business information sites, I found out that there are about 600 restaurants in the chain, 100 of them owned by the company itself, the rest are franchise operations.
WereBear
I’ve found that when you dig down to the truth of such myths, there’s usually a handy relative who died at the right time, or the person had a lot of rich friends who chipped in, or they got a big insurance settlement, or they simply got handed an existing business; and that is how the empire really got started.
Not to take away from Ted Turner; who built one UHF station into a true empire. But you know; his dad gave him the UHF station. It’s not like he started from scratch.
I’ve come to understand that being poor and saving means you don’t get to save very much. Freak it, you’re poor! Saving your entire salary still won’t get you very far.
Fucen Pneumatic Fuck Wrench Tarmal
gas, condoms, twinkies, and pizza.
this gives herman cain a 75% real merkin rating from sarahpac.
“our true enemy has yet to reveal himself”
PurpleGirl
@WereBear: …or the person had a lot of rich friends who chipped in,…
Those rich friends are more likely to a hedge fund or investment group like that owned by Mitt Romney or Peter Peterson, or anyone of a number on Wall Street, like KRK or Tiger Investments.
JD Rhoades
It’s a waste of time even thinking about Cain. He won’t make it past the SC primary.
WereBear
@PurpleGirl: Precisely, and connections mean a lot more than a good idea, then.
hrprogressive
What’s truly sad is that I absolutely believe that people like Palin, Gingrich, Bachmann, et al couldn’t do anything remotely business-like the way Cain might have with Godfather’s.
That’s how fucking low the bar is, and a good portion of these lunatics can’t even clear that.
And no, Palin monetizing her name as a brand doesn’t count. Any douchebag can do that, just look at anyone on “reality” TV these days.
PurpleGirl
@hrprogressive: And no, Palin monetizing her name as a brand doesn’t count. Any douchebag can do that, just look at anyone on “reality” TV these days.
Yup. Palin has to do something to keep her name in the public eye and keep the money coming in. After all, her reality show wasn’t renewed, I believe.
Comrade Luke
I really think everyone should be reading History Unfolding (wish it were on the blog roll). He only does one post a week, and it’s always awesome.
This week: Right-wingers then and now.
EJ
Sadly, I don’t have an anecdote about how Herman Cain is a fraud because there used to be a Godfather’s near my house and now there isn’t.
He took over a failing business unit, spun it out into a private company, made it profitable, and grew it. Seems like this is really tough to understand for some people.
This ain’t easy, and it sure as shit counts as success in business, regardless of whether you approve of gas station pizza or not.
Now, success in business doesn’t qualify one for the presidency, and Cain deserves to be mocked for all the crazy shit he says, but I don’t get why so many people refuse to give him credit for his business acumen.
Donut
@Hunter Gathers:
Why do you say Cain has no chance?
I am an Illinoisan so not easy for me to forget that Alan Keyes got 27% of the vote running against the same guy that Cain wants to run against next fall.
Yup, Republicans here drafted Keyes rather than him winning a primary, but dude still got 27% of the vote. A split up and divided and contentious GOP field might produce just about, well anything.
Crazier shit has been happening in American politics these last few years. Anything could happen.
Jerry
I never heard of Godfather’s Pizza until I moved to Central Illinois in the early to mid-’90s. Their advertising gimmick was to tell how much the pizza weighed, not how good it was. “The Five Pounder Pizza!!” or some such shit. It told me all that I needed to know about their pizza: it was just filler for the gut.
Donut: At the same time that Keyes was getting 27% of the vote in his Senate run against Obama, Bush was garnering a 27% favorability rating. That’s instructive as it tells us that the wack-a-doodle line in this country is 27% of the population.
Brachiator
@Jazz Superluminar:
This emphasizes the narrow focus stupidity of libertarianism. Why harp on minimum wage laws when the far bigger issue is the racist exclusion of black people from participating in unions and in the larger society? And of course, the black workers were not “naturally” low skilled; the apartheid system prevented their access to education and increased skills.
Since the ability to run a business is irrelevant to being president, I don’t even know why mistermix is even bringing this up. There is also an odd whiff of elitism here, as though the type of business Cain ran and his decisions are just not upper crust enough, which is ridiculous.
I find the wingnut love affair with Trump goofier than anything involving Cain.
zach
Here’s Herman Cain debating Bill Clinton regarding HillaryCare back in the day – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HdLGKRBJ_0E
He sounds quite reasonable and his numbers make sense… it’s a principled response that businesses primarily employing people near minimum wage with few benefits would’ve had problems. You see him talk about Obamacare today and he just lies, saying that socialized healthcare is failing around the world.
El Cid
Under Pillsbury, Cain was put in charge of rescuing the Burger King franchises of Philadelphia and after that success, to rescue Godfather’s.
He turned that BK region from the most money-losing to the most profitable, and Godfather’s into a hugely profitable chain for a while. It’s pathetic now outside its home bases like Omaha, but I wouldn’t be too quick to pin it on Cain.
Subways and McDonalds and Pizza Hut and Taco Bell and Domino’s also license their stuff out to a million gas stations. However, if I were running one of the biggest gas station chains and had the option, I’d sure as hell opt for the big names versus Godfather’s. And then below that you descend to these really regional cheapo grease loaded add-on’s which make Godfather’s look like health food.
I can’t stand the guy’s ass-kissing right wing lunacy, but I have zero problem with his business running.
At least unlike Domino’s Tom Moynaghan, as far as I know he didn’t use Godfather’s to pump money directly into anti-abortion activities.
Unless he used not just his prominence and connections and leadership in the National Restaurant Association but Godfather’s money in his asshole crusade against “Hillarycare”.
And it raises a more general question — what would you say differently if there were some crazy right wing asshole candidate whose business record was perfect as far as success and standard measures and no horrific pollution or whatever policies (just standard exploitation etc)?
For example, the libertarian head of the BB&T bank system, John Vaughan. Absolutely no problems with mortgage debts etc during the crash and bubble. As far as I know, a very, very solid, well-run bank.
Pretend it is. And he starts running for office. Now, he’s no Herman Cain yet in terms of loudmouthing, but enough out there about soshullism and freedom and shit.
Is it more noble for him to have led a bank than fast food franchises? Would the strategy be to point out any error in running his business as we perceived it?
If so, that’s a pretty shit strategy. And I think with Cain it risks really coming off as arrogant, snotty, and I think it very well could have a negative spin on that ultra-tiny number of ‘independents’ who really do decide to vote in part on tone.
On the other hand I’m so often wrong about this theme / voter reaction stuff I’m just reeling off what is my current feedback.
Fucen Pneumatic Fuck Wrench Tarmal
@El Cid:
ok, but as has been mentioned, government is not a business.
also, the godfather’s chain takes a little bit of liberty, to say the least, with the whole notion of a mob run pizza shop, and italian american stereotypes in general.
if a person doesn’t have have government experience, or some other experience to run on, shouldn’t their decision making in business be fair game?
El Cid
@Fucen Pneumatic Fuck Wrench Tarmal: How many times do I need to emphasize that I do not back him I do not like him I do not think he should be let anywhere near government and he is an asshole kissass right winger with typical lunatic libertarian / ultra-Reaganite economics?
You emphasize that government’s not a business because it’s not, not because you’re basing it on weak criticisms of how well a guy ran a business.
And if that’s not clear: I am 100% opposed to this crazy notion that gov’t is like a business and that Cain has the slightest ability to run any civil government much less the nation.
Actually, I guess government is run like a business often, depending on who’s running it and if they’re like the rape & pillage bondholder / buyout / parachuting-in executives.
But it certainly shouldn’t be.
Also, I do not support Hermain Cain nor think he has the slightest qualification in any real and sane sense to run any political post. But he did actually do extremely well in his business endeavors. I don’t give a shit about that when it comes to letting that nut near the Preznitzy.
[Also, I never could stand anything about Godfather’s Pizza, from the stupid name to the annoying as shit ads to the even more cheese-gummy pizza things they sell. But he did make it profitable. Which is not an endorsement.]
Mouse Tolliver
@sdhays:
Tiffani Amber Theisen’s dad is the guilty party.
Marc McKenzie
Really? This is shocking?
Christ, G.W. Bush ran three damned oil companies into the ground and then ended up bending the state of Texas over the railing and giving it the business. And yet this joker made it into the White House.
Well, what he did to those companies and Texas…he did to America. And we’re living through it.
Please, no more CEO’s in the White House.
BC
On the Davis-Bacon Act – it doesn’t exactly state that pay should be based on the union scale, it just says that if you get a federal government contract, you have to pay the “prevailing wage” for the area you’re in. You can’t make $$ on the backs of your workers if you’re a federal contractor. It just so happens that union scale is handy way to determine the “prevailing wage.”
lol
I must be one of the only people to like Godfather’s Pizza. It’s tasty.
Of course, they all seem to have closed in the past 10 years so I can never enjoy it.
EJ
@Marc McKenzie:
Actually, it might surprise you to learn that success in business is based on profits and growth, not on whether you or mistermix personally like the product. The “casual dining” market is extremely competitive and turning around a failing brand takes a lot of brains and hard work.
Yout comparison is invalid – Cain was very successful in business – GW Bush was not.
I’m just echoing what El Cid wrote out in much more detail. I don’t think business success is any qualification for the presidency, and I think Cain’s a loony, I just don’t think it’s fair to claim his business acumen is phony.
Fucen Pneumatic Fuck Wrench Tarmal
@El Cid:
i was just attempting to answer your question, as to whether or not his business career can or should be picked apart, in lieu of anything else, yes.
jimbob
@Comrade Luke: Thank you for that. I just spent the afternoon reading the archives. Guy knows his stuff.
jimbob
@Mouse Tolliver: Rong. Wiki it.
MNP
Godfather’s Pizza are one of my top 3 of favorite pizza chains. I think of places with multiple stores I only like Big Tomato (the Iowa outfit) more. Though of course local places can sometimes have even better pizza.
MaxxLange
that’s…..amazing. this is why we shouldn’t have APARTHEID, not why we shouldn’t have minimum wage.
Steaming Pile
I remember Godfathers from the late 70s when they had a guy dressed as a heavily-stereotypical Mafioso doing their commercials. The pizza was actually pretty good in those days.