1965-Fraser-Valley-Milk-Break.Pdf

1965 Publishedbi-monthly for the employeesof ilk reakthe Fraser Valley Milk Producers' Association VOLUME 3, NUMBER l ~20 JANUARY - FEBRUARY, 1965 It Was Tough Sledding! Fewcustomers were withoutmilk Despiteworst conditions in years Dairyland's complex milk collection and delivery system came through the record cold snap and snowfall battered but not broken. Except on a few of the worst accident total of about 20 sky days, milk from all farms was rocketed to more than 70, to picked up and customers, both the consternation of safety su retai l and wholesale, were sup pervisor Bill Makweis. plied. Although most of these acci To provide this service, how dents were fortunately of a ever, many of the association's minor nature, they aggravated drivers and sales staff put in a shortage of spare trucks, working days of up to 20 caused by the replacement pro straight hours under the worst gram for the retail fleet. kind of conditions. The worst accident in the As one retail driver put it Dairyland delivery system in after a particularly miserable volved one of the association's day in wet, deep snow: "I quit contract hauler s. More than four times today." $1700 worth of products and The record of accidents in $700 in cases were lost when volving association vehicles il a Clark Reefer Lines Ltd. lustrates just how bad driving trailer truck plunged down the conditions became. In De Thompson River canyon near cember the normal monthly Spences Bridge. HUGESNOW BANKS heaped up by bulldozers erties route made it difficult to serve many and graders on Percy Greenwell's British Prop - houses without the kind of help received here . Tankers in Trouble Alherniand Rupert On three occasions, farm up snow-clogged side streets . pick-up tankers skidded into Other drivers phoned their Fraser Valley ditches and had customers and arranged to have to be unloaded with portable them pick up their milk from Dairyland G,oes Farther Afield pumps . the truck or from other homes Dairyland extended its Association assumed the ice branch in Prince Rupert and One tanker driver, John Nes the driver could get to. " Wholesale drivers had their widely-scattered operations cream and frozen foods busi Dairyland sales representative ~el, carried 1800 pounds of ness of McKinnon's Dairy in Jim Kerr will be moving there milk in pails to his truck from troubles too, but managed to even farther into the B.C. Port Alberni. Twice-a-week de as manager of the new outlet. a barn 100 yards away, when serve every account except the hinterland at the beginning livery began January 2. The opening of branches in he could not get through drifts Hollyburn Winter Club. Snow of the year. At the same time many hun Prince Rupert and Nanaimo has in the driveway . (Continued on page 4) dred miles to the north, Dairy brought 16 new employees into Service from the Nanaimo land took over the milk, ice the Association. On the Prince ZERO AND BELOW branch was extended into the cream and frozen foods busi Rupert staff are Stan Weisbrod, Because the heavy farm tank Port Alberni area when the ness of Norwest Refrigerated Stan Douglass, David Finlay-. ers wear out an expensive set Foods in Prince Rupert. son, Matthew Leggeat, Warren of chains in a single round trip, Working out of a main Lindsay, Al Phillipson, Gerhard they are not put on unless the StaffLounge branch at Prince Rupert and a Schmidt, Milburga Maku and truck becomes stranded some depot at Terrace, a nine-man P. T. Delaney. where along its route. For the sales staff is serving a wide The new employees at Na tanker drivers this meant put NowPlanned area on the mainland and towns naimo are Bill Brankston, Clive ting on chains at the roadside on the Queen Charlotte Islands. Clark, Bill Damery, Ken Horne, in temperatures near zero and The conference room on Omer Tupper has spent sev Bill Shaw, George Slater and even below . the second floor of the new eral weeks organizing the Jean Kirby. For men like traffic manager plant office is going to Wally Kendall and Harry Whit be partly refurnished and lam at Sardis, the period of December 15 to January 15 made available to em NewSocial Club Could brought one crisis after another. ployees as a lounge and During all of this time they reading room. were constantly within reach by IncludeAll Activities telephone . One-half of the room will be furnished with settees, chairs, FVMP A employees are showing considerable in FOUR FEET DEEP lamps and tables, while the con terest in the proposed company-wide social club and plans ference table and chairs will be Meanwhile , conditions at retained in the other half so for the club are becoming more ambitious. Haney and in the Vancouver that the room can still be used Most departments in the As- area were no better. On the for meetings . higher levels of North and West sociation were represented at an People from the various The lounge and meeting area Vancouver the snow reached organizing meeting December sports teams and leagues, social can be divided by a sound 12 and a committee was formed more than four feet in depth, groups and other clubs within making it impossible for retail proof folding wall, so that the to consider a number of differ the Association were invited to lounge will still be available drivers to get to within several ent suggestions on what form a meeting on February 2. when there is a meeting m the club should take and the blocks of some homes . progress. scope of its activities. Purpose of bringing all em Even then most of the cus Purpose of the lounge is to Since that time, it has been ployee groups together is to ex tomers were served in one way MANY DRIVERSlike relief man Ed Broome borrowed to provide employees with a place decided to include representa plore the feasibility of co-ordi or another. Several drivers bor boggans and sleds to carry to relax after lunch or during tives of all employee activities nating all these activities under rowed their children's sleighs or milk up side streets that were other free time . in preliminary discussions . a single fund . toboggans to haul cases of milk impassable to trucks . ... WarmThanks for Cold Work from the Alter 38 Years It took a lot of wet feet, cold hands and lugging Manager 's baskets of milk up streets thigh-deep in snow, but very Cece Pearson few Dairyland cuscomers were without milk for very long. Desk Our sales statf - both retail and wholesale - gave By L. A. Atkinson more than was required of them and the customers showed FVMPA General Manager In Retirement their appreciation. Many calls of thanks came to the At the end of the year 1964, Retirement in October concluded 38 years on the Customer Service Department. everyone at Dairyland could local dairy scene for former Dairyland branch manager look back on a year full of ac CECE PEARSON. A letter from MRS. MULLER-CLEM,who lives at the tivities, some gratifying, some top of Mountain Highway in North Vancouver, where the frustrating, and yet, over all, From 1950 to 1959 he was snow was more than four feet deep, expresses the gratitude a year with a manager of the North Vancou great many ver branch and he managed the of many customers. She writes: satisfactions. Vancouver Heights branch from "My family and I would like to express our apprecia Everyone will 1959 until it was closed for the tion of Dairyland's work, particularly during the past few remember the move to the new plant. weeks. Your drivers have delivered our milk promptly difficulties of Pr ior to 1950, Cece had transferring been an inspector since 1942 and with their customary politeness, in spite of the worst men and and a retail driver in two Van weather conditions. equipment couver districts. "On the one day when snow made it impossible for from our He first began in the Van former Dairy couver dairy business with Pur them to reach us, they phoned us in good time for us to land, Arctic and Shannon oper ity Dairy after he came from reach the collecting point. ations, to the new plant. his native Winnipeg in 1926. "It seems to us that it might lighten your load some You will recall, too, the satis He changed over to Valley what to know that your customers appreciate fully this factions experienced by the fact Dairy in 1928 and was among that throughout the moving those who joined the FVMP A ,, high standard of service." period all of our customers' re through the formation of Asso quirements were looked after ciated Dairies in 1931. CECE PEARSON well. In retirement, Cece is at least temporarily limited by poor health, but he hopes to do 20,000 VISITORS some travelling. Don't You Believe It The new plant was hailed by While convalescing, Cece en extension of our present ante tertains himself by watching a The best things in life may not be free, but some the dairy industry of Canada, and by many thousands of con room cold storage space and the portable television set given to times they cost less than we think. sumers, as the most modern, completion of the landscaping him jointly by the FVMPA and Take living in B.C. , for example . Our friends from best laid out and best equipped around the new plant. the Dairyland Staff and Wel Among the uncertainties are other parts of Canada agree that B.C.

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