In their Ground Beef Handling guide the United States Department of Agriculture or USDA, recommends that restaurants cook the meat to 155 degrees plus 15-seconds, before serving sliding it on a bun and serving America’s favorite patty.
The extra time in the heat enough to kill the e coli bacteria which sickens 265,000 and kills more than 100 Americans each year.
Their deaths a tragedy. Until you learn that Americans consume more than 50 billion hamburgers per-year. At which point those deaths become a statistical certainty!
Black and Blue
Growing up, my mother prepared our burgers and other red meat black and blue or Pittsburgh style; charred on the outside and cool in the center. The preparation designed to ensure our carcinogens and bacteria were in proper balance!
But since moving to an assisted living facility in April my mother has no kitchen to flip a burger to her liking. Mah now forced to eat her red meat cooked to a temperature which puts public health first.
“I like it the way I made it at home” my mother shared recently after ordering a burger rare, knowing it won't come that way.
My mother adding, “and it doesn’t mean I was a bad cook!” Defending herself from a disparaging comment she knew I was likely to make.
My mother’s cooking remains the punchline of the Lipton family’s longest running joke. My sister Marci and I certain that our mother prepared burgers and steaks black and blue not due to her preference for the temperature but due to her limited cooking skills.
Because she served chicken the same way!
In THE News!
On my podcast last week, I shared that the country’s ninth largest paint manufacturer Kelly-Moore had been acquired by the Miami-based private equity firm, the Flacks Group.
THE episode reaching 500 views and listens before it ended its first day, a milestone which generally takes a new episode a week or two to achieve!
And while I always enjoy the extra attention, the fast rise to the top of the charts begs the question, Why the sudden interest in a west coast paint manufacturer with limited distribution in the independent channel?
What a coincidence!
For more than two-score-years paint manufacturers and paint brands, have been exiting the independent channel. Of the six brands we sold at Tremont Paint in 1990, Benjamin Moore, PPG, Pratt & Lambert, Paragon, General Coatings, and Muralo only two, Benjamin Moore, and PPG, continue to maintain any significant presence in THE channel.
The possibility that Kelly-Moore may offer supply options for dealers in need of them, likely accounting for at-least some of the added interest in last week’s podcast.
And dealers wondering exactly what Kelly-Moore's plans are for THE channel won't have to wait long.
That's because on my podcast next week my guest will be former New York independent paint retailer Gus Giannopoulos. Gus’ new venture, THE Axios Coatings Group, is THE official distributor and sales partner for Kelly-Moore and Kelly-Moore branded paints in the northeast United States.
During the episode, recorded two-weeks before the Flacks Group announced their acquisition of Kelly-Moore, Gus shares his and Kelly-Moore's strategy reaching dealers and for getting the brand recognized by the professional painters the company's stores in the west tend to attract.
The first new dealer-only full-line paint brand offered by a national manufacturer over the entirety of my career!
The distribution model Kelly-Moore is using is also new to the channel. Less centralized, it puts gallons close to the market unlike the longer supply chains which failed so many manufacturers during the pandemic and supply chain crises.
Only time will tell what plans Kelly-Moore has to grow their business in the independent channel. Charles Gassenheimer, managing director of the Flacks Group is quoted as saying about the purchase that, “We see this transaction as a platform with the potential for bolt-on acquisitions in the small and mid-size paint spaces.”
Sounds like moore to come!
Disclosure: Due to the coincidental timing of my coverage of the Kelly-Moore announcement and my podcast with Gus I feel compelled to state the following: I found out about the Kelly-Moore acquisition soon after the news was made public on the company’s web site on September 28, more than two-weeks after I recorded the episode with Gus. I have had no professional dealings nor talks of dealing with either Axios or Kelly-Moore.
