The Little Company That Could
By
Jaeger

Once upon a time there was a small, Western Canadian company. Three guys in the railway industry, who were tired of working for The Man, got together and built aftermarket electronics for trains and were successful for about twenty–five years. People liked working for the three guys because they were kind, and generous, and always gave nice holiday bonus’ and threw the best parties and BBQs for their employees. Many employees would comment that it was more like a family than a company, and this was true. One day a BIG CORPORATION from the States decided they were tired of losing business to this small, uppity, family based company, so they decided to buy it. They offered a heap of cash to the three guys and they accepted happily. The three guys then gave BIG bonus cheques to everybody that worked at the Little Red Train Company and said thank you and good bye. The workers at the Little Red Train Company were a little nervous. The day the takeover was announced, the BIG CORPORATION told everyone that there would be absolutely NO DOWNSIZING OR LAYOFFS under any circumstances. This made the employees very happy. Then five weeks later, the BIG CORPORATION laid-off half of the staff of the Little Red Train Company and gave the work to their own people in the United States. This made the employees of the Little Company very sad. A year passed, and the Little Red Train Company was doing better than ever and had even brought back some of the people the BIG CORPORATION had gotten rid of and was wondering what would happen next. Out of nowhere, an even BIGGER MEGA-CORPORATION swallowed up the BIG CORPORATION like a whale straining plankton. The BIGGER MEGA-CORPORATION didn’t quite know what to do with the little train company because it already had several other companies in its massive belly that made a lot of the same products. Unfortunately for the BIGGER MEGA-CORPORATION, the Little Red Train Company made the best products in the industry, and MANY customers told them that they wouldn’t buy from them anymore if they shut down the Little Red Train Company. A few years later there was an industry wide downturn and every company within the BIGGER MEGA-CORPORATION was making very little money, except for the Little Red Train Company who was in fact experiencing RECORD HIGH SALES for the third year running! At every monthly meeting the managers of the Little Red Train Company would tell the employees that everything was just fine, because as far as they knew it was. Then one day, BIG BOSS BOB showed up and told everyone in the Little Red Train Company that he had mixed feelings. This made people very nervous. “We’re boned!” Said someone from the back of the room – then there was silence. BIG BOSS BOB then told everyone that they had all just been made redundant. Yes, BIG BOSS BOB said that the MAJOR SHAREHOLDERS had decided to shut down the Little Red Train Company because it didn’t look good for a little Subsidiary to be propping up Head Office which was losing money. So they took all the money making products away from the Little Red Train Company (keeping the product labels so the customers wouldn’t know the difference), fired the employees and sold off the assets. So remember kids, the only advantage to being a Little fish inside a BIG fish inside a BIGGER fish is that sometimes it takes a little longer to be digested!