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• Reluctance to innovate and update, often times what is said is, “Why would we
change? That’s not how we always do it.” This is a very shortsighted view but I guess
it’s got us this far.
• Most of the property cold rooms are plywood or plywood covered by sheet metal or
other wash down material. This presents opportunities for bacteria and mold
growth not to mention Listeria.
• The way the Food Safety Industry is going we may not pass inspections or get a high
enough rating to keep business coming to our facilities.
• I believe the competition may be ahead of the game.
• Competition. System and equipment upgrades needed to keep up with industry.
Cash flow. Staff member undermining change.
• Competitors building copycat equipment.
• Some employees with a not my job attitude.
• A large food safety incident.
• Serious drought conditions.
• This is confidential..... I have experienced bullying. I don't think it has been taken
seriously; others have quit because of it.
• Cash flow and debt are certainly problems or challenges.
• The age of our facilities.
• Lose market share and become outdated
• Old equipment costing more to repair and shrinking profit limiting the ability to
invest in new technology
• Overworking workforce due to lack of new hires can potential increase the chances
for someone getting hurt and worsening morale
• Competition from modern cooler facilities - Azzopardi, D'Arrigo, Uni-Kool, Western
precooling coolers that can take our customers
• Stagnation and no change
• Food Safety issues events and regulation
• Ammonia and refrigeration regulation and restrictions
• Salinas Property features that may be condemned
• Storm Water regulation on new buildings
• Drought
• Property Electrical grid failure
• Recruiting of refrigeration, maintenance, and key supervisor positions into the future
• Labor issues and cost not being controlled
• Unknown property issues that may rear their head
• A lot of the most experienced members of the company (especially in the office) are
getting close to retirement age. The younger crews are being trained, but sometimes it
seems like we rely on a few highly trained employees a bit too much. When someone
leaves (as recently happened in the Engineering department) it creates a big vacuum
for a while, since finding someone with the VERY specific skills GIC requires
(knowledge of Ammonia, Andover programming knowledge, ability to weld multiple
types of materials) can take a while.

Prepared for Growers Ice Company, Inc.
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Jim White, PhD --- JL White International