Day 059 - 01 Dec 94 - Page 34


     
     1        polystyrene foam?
     2        A.  Not directly.  If I might comment on the Asia Pacific
     3        situation, all of those countries are supplied by a Pacific
     4        (indistinguishable) in Hong Kong.  The equipment that they
     5        installed into a new factory gave them the capability to
     6        use C02 as a blowing agent.  If we were to put the same
     7        equipment into, say, Lin Pac, the supplier here in the UK,
     8        it would cost in the region of £320,000 to install and the
     9        yield from the polystyrene foam would be 15 per cent worse
    10        than it is currently today.
    11
    12        That answers, on the one side, the Asia Pacific part of the
    13        question.  On the other side, am I aware of any new
    14        developments, yes, I am.  There are two new developments
    15        currently taking place, one here with Lin Pac in the UK,
    16        and another one with a new supplier in the USA.
    17
    18   Q.   Is that information commercially sensitive?
    19        A.  It is -- very.
    20
    21   Q.   Yes, I can understand that.  So, unless his Lordship
    22        requires it, I will not ask you any more about it save
    23        this:  Do those two new ideas, if I may call them that,
    24        involve the use of carbon dioxide or not?
    25        A.  No.
    26
    27   Q.   Again I apologise for this, can you put that one away,
    28        please, and extract (which you will need in a minute) the
    29        next one on which is Volume V again with the same heading?
    30        A.  OK.
    31
    32   Q.   Leave it there for the moment while I ask you, if I may,
    33        some introductory questions.  You have been at McDonald's
    34        since 1978.  During that time or from that time, I should
    35        say, what was the packaging used for the sandwiches from
    36        1978?
    37        A.  The large sandwiches?
    38
    39   Q.   Yes.
    40        A.  It was foam packaging.
    41
    42   Q.   So, for the large sandwiches in this country, so far as you
    43        have experienced McDonald's, it has always been foam, has
    44        it?
    45        A.  Yes, except for the one very brief period where we did
    46        test cardboard packaging and we did test wraps, but purely
    47        in a number of stores to gauge customer reaction which was
    48        very poor.
    49
    50   Q.   What I want to trace with you, if I may, Mr. Oakley, is not 
    51        the history of the wrapping but the history of the blowing 
    52        agent used to produce the foam? 
    53        A.  Yes.
    54
    55   Q.   When you first joined the company in 1978, what was the
    56        blowing agent which was used in those days?
    57        A.  It was hydrocarbon Isopentane.
    58
    59   Q.   How long did McDonald's suppliers who are called Lin Pac,
    60        I think ---

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