In Pursuit of the Common Good: Twenty-Five Years of Improvin...

In Pursuit of the Common Good: Twenty-Five Years of Improving the World, One Bottle of Salad Dressing at a Time

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Paul had always been perverse about complacency. It was his theory that he had to keep things off balance or it’s finito.

A.E. Hotchner • In Pursuit of the Common Good: Twenty-Five Years of Improving the World, One Bottle of Salad Dressing at a Time

“We don’t think you’ll get anywhere with Crowley. He already turned us down.” “Gentlemen,” Stew said, “I am Andy’s best customer—I sell more Ken’s than all his other customers combined. If your dressing measures up, I assure you he will bottle it.”

A.E. Hotchner • In Pursuit of the Common Good: Twenty-Five Years of Improving the World, One Bottle of Salad Dressing at a Time

You can get straight As in marketing and still flunk ordinary life. —NEWMAN TO LEE IACOCCA AFTER IACOCCA’S PINTO CAUGHT FIRE

A.E. Hotchner • In Pursuit of the Common Good: Twenty-Five Years of Improving the World, One Bottle of Salad Dressing at a Time

One day the two of them ran into a friend of a friend, late of the restaurant business, now in shoes, who flatly stuck his finger in PL’s chest and said, “We were always filled to the rafters but no profit. I was skimmed to death, skimmed! Waiters in collusion with the cashier! [This is before computers, remember.] They saved up all the cash regist

A.E. Hotchner • In Pursuit of the Common Good: Twenty-Five Years of Improving the World, One Bottle of Salad Dressing at a Time

But to Andy’s surprise, after testing, his chemists concluded that since Paul’s dressing consisted of oil and vinegar and contained mustard, those elements combined to form a natural gum.

A.E. Hotchner • In Pursuit of the Common Good: Twenty-Five Years of Improving the World, One Bottle of Salad Dressing at a Time

From the very beginning, we bucked tradition. When the experts said that something was “always done” in a certain way, we’d do it our way, which was sometimes the very opposite.

A.E. Hotchner • In Pursuit of the Common Good: Twenty-Five Years of Improving the World, One Bottle of Salad Dressing at a Time

“I think I’ll sleep on it,” Paul said. “Maybe I’ll dream something that will put me straight. I’ve had a lot of luck with my dreams.”

A.E. Hotchner • In Pursuit of the Common Good: Twenty-Five Years of Improving the World, One Bottle of Salad Dressing at a Time

We now needed a name for this sauce, and what we came up with—Newman’s Own Industrial Strength All-natural Venetian-style Spaghetti Sauce—horrified our brokers. “Industrial strength! They’ll think it’s for factories—they’ll never buy it to put on spaghetti.” As usual, we disregarded their “expertise”

A.E. Hotchner • In Pursuit of the Common Good: Twenty-Five Years of Improving the World, One Bottle of Salad Dressing at a Time

It was Newman’s insistent desire to market the dressing that kept Hotch in motion. Scarcely a day passed but what Paul was calling from some unlikely place to discuss a newly discovered source for the perfect olive oil, the perfect red wine vinegar, the perfect mustard, and so on, which he constantly sought. He phoned Hotch from racetracks, in betw