Robert Mondavi

Summary:

Perrier, an international mineral water company, has experienced many resistances to changes that affected the development and growth due of the stubbornness of the CGT union, which represents the employees, according the CEO of Perrier, Peter Brabeck-Letmathe.

Analysis:

Perrier, a mineral water company, can be traced back to a local Dr. Louis-Euge'ne Perrier, who bought the mineral water source near Verge'ze, France. Perrier was the leader of the mineral water industry, world wide. The little green bottle made its way to North America, to open the first office in New York in 1976. After many years of continued growth the company reached its peak in the 80’s, but by the early 90’s it almost collapsed when a trace of benzene was found in a bottle.

Perrier struggled to regain growth especially after it was purchased by Nestle' in the 1992. One of the biggest struggles was the resistance to change from the employees’ union, CGT. The union was viewed by management as consistently resisting Nestlй’s attempts to improve Perrier’s’ financial performance. Jean-Paul Franc, head of CGT, on the other hand, refused Nestlй’s proposed lay-off of 15% of the work force, protesting that “Nestlй’s can’t do whatever it likes”, stating “Morally, the water and gas underground is owned by the region”.

Resistance to change may take many forms. Hultman draws a distinction between active and passive resistance to change and identifies a range of symptoms associated with each. (Hultman 1998). Some of the symbols of active resistance that affected Perrier are:

Using fact selectively; appealing to fear; intimidating or threatening; blocking; starting rumor and undermining.

Some of the symptoms identified with passive resistance are:

Failing to implement; standing by and allowing change to fail and procrastinating.

According to the Palmer, et, al, the union believed that the proposed changes would have a negative effect on the interest of the