240 CHAPTER 15 came from the crates. Around the sugar factories, outside the factory boundaries, you’d see these little shacks go up, many of which were stamped with “The Western States Machine Company” name. Years ago, I took a trip to Colombia. While there, I stayedinaprettynicehoteldowntown.However,the hotel charged an extra $150 nightly security fee, to post an armed guard with an M-16 outside my room each night. Many people were being kidnapped and held for ransom, including Americans. If you were in a car going down the road and you didn’t see any oncoming cars, you turned around and went back the way you came because in all probability the guerrillas had established a roadblock up ahead and were kidnapping people and holding them for ransom. One of the sugar factory managers had his son taken for something like $10 Million Pesos (with the Columbian exchange rate, approximately $3,500 ransom demand). As a result, you had to be careful where you traveled. It was safe if you knew where you were going. You depended a lot on your local route and your local people to tell you where or where not to go. Even with an armed guard, I’d have a hard time sleeping. — Roger Fair MIND YOUR METRICS Tom Bowen and I were down on a trip in Colombia working at this factory. He wanted to get a little washer made, a simple 3 mm (.118 inch) washer. It was taking forever and Tom couldn’t figure out why it was taking so long for this factory to make the part. It was then that we discovered Tom wasn’t that good with metrics. Two days later, we watched them roll out a 3 M diameter (9.8 feet) washer instead of a 3 mm washer. The look on his face was priceless! — Bob Jones HAPPENSTANCE I started with Western States as a research consultant while I was earning a Master’s degree in international development from Chulalongkorn University in Thailand after spending more than 15 years in the Marines. My thesis topic centered around a sugar factory and a sugar cane plantation in Cambodia, when coincidentally the offer to do part time work for Western States seemingly fell out of the sky. When my classmates and faculty learned of my part time job many of them became skeptical about whether working for Western States was just by chance or if there was more to it. Life is kind of funny that way. Even though it really was by chance, I still like to keep the mystique alive. I haven’t been with Western States as long as most of the others in our Company but it still means a lot to me. I take great pride in representing an American manufacturer that is known as the best in the industry. I enjoy visiting factories all over the region that you can’t even find on Google Maps and I enjoy learning something new every day about our machines and about the market I am responsible for. Most of all though are the people. Any good organization is the product of the quality and the effort of its people. Past and present, we have great people and that is how we made it this far. — John Cherry RED HEAD I went to Guatemala for a week. At the time, I had bright red hair. The Guatemalans were very nice but obviously I didn’t blend in. The gentleman that was taking me around, Carlos, was a friend of Western States. He asked, "Are you uncomfortable?" I said, "Not really. Everybody seems pleasant enough."