02/25/05 United Fresh Potato`s new CEO

United Fresh Potato Growers of Idaho is serious about unifying the industry. United has hired 53 year old Jerry Wright to be the co-op's initial CEO. United's Dave Beesley says they believe that Wright can do for potato growers what he did for Embasa Foods as its president. He took six smaller Mexican food companies and rolled them into a 100 million-dollar firm with 250 employees. BEESLEY "We've given him a list of all the bits and pieces that we foresee as necessary in the business plan for United and in the formation and operation of United of America. And we're going to lean on him heavily to boil that down and formulate it into a narrow, very tightly focused business plant that we can move forward with." Beesley and other United officials are off to Washington DC next week for meetings on the national co-op. BEESLEY "And we expect at that meeting that we'll have representatives from every potato producing state and three Canadian provinces." Oregon, Washington, Colorado, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and Maine are all talking about joining the national effort. Voice of Idaho Agriculture Bill Scott