Few people appreciate the promise and the peril of the fast-growing natural-foods business as well as Irwin Simon, the energetic founder and CEO of the Hain Celestial Group. In the decade or so that Simon, 46, has been cobbling together the niche category's leader by buying up dozens of mom-and-pop brands, he has had to deal with all sorts of situations that aren't typically covered in business school. During one of Hain's recent acquisitions, the seller tried to insist that his factories be closed on Saturdays for religious reasons. Then there was the time not long ago when Simon discovered that...
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