OPINION —
In 2023, many people have accepted a job offer, especially for a part-time position. But a lot of them resort to complaining about the job. They call it “demeaning” and claim they only do it because they needed a job. They would feel better about their work if they knew the history of their company.
They should appreciate that they are cogs in a large machine — minor cogs, usually — but part of a worldwide team that makes products that please consumers. Capitalism works. For instance, I asked employees of CVS Health in northern states what the acronym stands for. Most did not know it stood for Consumer Value Store.
Headquartered in Woonsocket, Rhode Island, it is the largest pharmacy chain in the United States; it had more than 9,600 stores as of 2016 and the most total prescription revenue. Knowing the history of your employer makes you more content as you grasp your role in a very successful enterprise.
“If a man is a street-sweeper, he should sweep streets even as Michelangelo painted, or Beethoven composed music or Shakespeare wrote poetry,” said Martin Luther King Jr. in one of his most famous quotes. “He should sweep streets so well that all the hosts of heaven and Earth will pause to say, ‘Here lived a great street-sweeper who did his job well.’”
An interesting criminal case for me was that of former Rhode Island State Sen. John Celona, a friend of mine during the 1976 election. Two years earlier, he won election to the North Providence City Council at age 24. After several years in the state senate, he was charged with crimes including bribery, conspiracy and fraud by federal prosecutors. He spent two and a half years in jail for mail fraud. The corruption investigation was called Operation Dollar Bill.
However, former CVS executives John Kramer and Carlos Ortiz were acquitted after a 2008 charge of bribery, conspiracy and fraud by a federal grand jury for allegedly paying Celona to act as a “consultant” for the company. The lesson here is that CVS employees, if they study the corporation’s city, would find the good news that this case resulted in an acquittal for them.
“After serving two and a half years in prison, I have racked up $178,000 in fines for failing to file campaign finance reports,” Celona said years afterward. “What this has done to my family is terrible. We declared bankruptcy. I lost my house. I lost my marriage.”
Last week, I drove by Celona’s family’s lawn mower store, where he talked politics with me regularly from 1976 to 1978. He ended up a prisoner of his own ambitions — another tragedy.
In the early 2000s, the International House of Pancakes officially became the acronym IHOP. Reliable sources say that was tied to the Iraq War, which was not at all popular with Europeans. Or it connected with the company’s ideas of making the stores accessible: with the simple IHOP replacing the grandfatherly International House of Pancakes. The IHOP in Auburn has been gone a long time, and the original façade on the stores — a Swiss chalet — is rarely seen.
IHOP used this acronym for decades; International House of Pancakes was stuffy and ineffective. Using the full name made people expect a selection of fancy European-style pancakes. The term IHOP is sappy and sounds too much like something a rabbit would say. Still, if new employees at the IHOPs still standing study the company history, they might become prouder. The company plans to launch a chain of fast-casual breakfast restaurants called Flip’d.
The company has 1,841 locations in the Americas (United States, Canada, Mexico, Peru, Ecuador and Guatemala) and other restaurants in the Middle East and in the South Asian Subcontinent, including 161 owned by area licensees and 1,680 that are franchised.
Courtesy is a lodestar of any business and what brings people back to your store. But they need enhancement in many stores by the workers learning more about their new job. Having a likable name or acronym is certainly an asset. The wrong one will hurt your bottom dollar.
I am reminded of WHINSEC, an atrocious name for any agency or store. It succeeds the terrific name School of the Americas. WHINSEC is a mouthful, set up by a committee. It stands for Western Hemisphere Institute of Security and Cooperation. The change was in response to those November protesters who for decades claimed that the SOS was full of torturers.
There was modest solid evidence of that. In any case, knowing the background of the area where you work is helpful in keeping a positive attitude and good productivity. As IHOP says, “Come Hungry, Leave Happy.”
Greg Markley first moved to Lee County in 1996. He has master’s degrees in education and history. He taught politics as an adjunct in Georgia and Alabama. An award-winning writer in the Army and civilian life, he has contributed to The Observer for 12 years. gm.markley@charter.net