Tyson Foods 2000 Annual Report Download - page 7

strengths and our vision for the future, I believe Tyson
Foods is well positioned to take advantage of improving
market conditions.
Our vision at Tyson is to be the world’s first choice for
chicken while maximizing shareholder value. Our goals:
The capital investment strategy we will use to meet
these goals is based on return on invested capital (ROIC).
Our finance committee oversees the strategy to ensure
p ro fit i m p rovement plans have an ROIC that exceeds our
w e i g h ted average cost of capital. Capital expenditures a re
down 46 p e rcent from last year. Spending was less than
d e p rec i ation, yet significant enough to continue impro v i n g
the quality of our assets.
GROWTH THROUGH I NNOVAT I O N
Some people might think research and development at
Tyson means searching for the next chicken nugget. While
we’re always on the lookout for food innovations, that’s not
the only area for potential growth. Our R&D efforts will
lead to new products that will reach less developed countries
as well as create new opportunities domestically. We’re
using science and technology to create alternative uses for
non-prime chicken parts such as oils, proteins and fibers.
We remain committed to leading edge processing tech-
nology. This year, as part of our strategic initiatives, we
developed “The Center for Operational Excellence.” This is
a group of processing engineers and performance specialists
who help our plant management and equipment suppliers
ensure optimum equipment performance and operational
best practices. To our knowledge, we are the only company
in our industry with such a resource.
Our commitment to technology reaches much deeper
into the marketplace than just our products and plants. In
April we teamed with the nation’s leading protein providers
to form the first industry backed business-to-business
m a rketplace focused on meat and poultry. In July we joined
other foodservice industry leaders to develop eFS Network,
an Internet company that will operate an independent
business-to-business marketplace to facilitate supply
chain e ff iciencies within the foodser vice business channel.
As a founding member and partner in both companies, we
will be instrumental in designing the business processes that
will meet our customers’ changing needs in the future.
To maintain our competitive advantage in the market-
place, we continue to build brand awareness and brand
equity with our customers and consumers, even during
downturns in industry profits. Last spring we launched our
new advertising campaign that supports our brand promise
of quality chicken our consumers can trust. “Tyson. It’s
what your family deserves.” begs the question: Why would
you serve your family anything but the best?
Take good care of our people
Fulfill 100 percent of our customers’ needs for
chicken products
Continue building the value of the Tyson brand
Continue to grow and defend our share in
targeted markets
Expand the geographic distribution of our products
Increase the international segment of our business
Continue our leadership in the development of
value-added products
Continue cost cutting initiatives
the advantages far outweigh the costs.
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