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Nestlé likes to hire "butchers' sons," put them through its own Management Development Institute, and send them abroad to "hardship posts" for final tempering before they settle down in the showy glass and aluminum headquarters building alongside Lake Geneva. Nestlé also believes strongly in divided authority. Currently, the company has two managing directors (it once had five). Laconic, burly Jean Corthésy, 55, handles day-today operations. Outgoing, Lugano-born Enrico Bignami, 56, is responsible for planning. This arrangement—which was decided by the flip of a five-franc coin—will hold till next January. Then Bignami and Corthésy will switch hats for a year.
No to Rockets. Nestlé probably needs two managers. Its operations are vastly complicated by its determination to give customers exactly the product they want. In Switzerland alone, Nestlé markets its wares in 1,500 different packages, and around the world there are 40 varieties of Nescafé, each adjusted to local tastes in coffee. "We really spoil the client too much," says one Vevey executive.
Operating under a series of three, six-and nine-year plans, Nestlé is now considering branching out beyond food. Says Corthésy: "We won't say no to anything—except rockets and heavy steel." But Nestlé will surely go on saying yes quickest to food products, because of a Vevey doctrine unchanged in nearly a century. "People will always eat," says Corthésy. "Well, or badly, they will always eat."
*Each share of Nestlé stock is represented by two certificates: one issued by Unilac of Panama, the holding company for Nestlé's Western Hemisphere operations, and one by Nestlé Alimentana. As of last week, Nestlé's registered shares were selling for $510 while "bearer shares" (which carry no name and are handy in ducking tax collectors) stood at $840.