Democrat and Chronicle from Rochester, New York • Page 6

'I 1 6A SATURDAY, OCTOBER 11, 2003 DemocratandChronicle.com DEMOCRAT AND CHRONICLE Meanwhile, Wegmans has Transplants FROM PAGE 1A then announced that it would launch an investigation of its own. State officials could not be reached Friday about Strong's liver transplant program. Transplant experts said developments like these could further undermine public confidence in the fairness of the national organ sharing system. In July, a civil lawsuit was unsealed against three Chicago hospitals, accusing them of manipulating waiting lists in order to boost the number of transplants, which in turn increased revenue and profits. "If the public perceives that hospitals are subverting the fairness of the system, organ donations will stop," said Dr.

Raymond Pollak, a University of Illinois Medical Center surgeon Wegmans FROM PAGE 1A she'd been shopping at the Mt. Hope Wegmans for, "oh, God, a lot of years." "It's terrible," she said of the closing. Everything's "moving out into the outskirts." The closing leaves only two Wegmans stores within Rochester city limits one on Driving Park Avenue and one on East Avenue. Wegmans closed two of its smaller city stores in 1995 when it shuttered locations at Mid-town Plaza, and at Bay Street and Culver Road. The company said at the time that it was moving away from the small-store format and concentrating on its superstore concept, which has resulted in groceries such as the one on Monroe Avenue, next to Pittsford Plaza.

"Wegmans is very clear on its strategy," said Debra Perosio, director of Cornell University's Food Industry Management program. "The strategy is to build the big stores. That's who they are. They aren't going to waver from that. "They are absolutely dedicated to that footprint.

They know how to do it better than anybody else. And I think in a way they are smart by sticking with what they do best and continuing to build the type of stores that Wegmans is known for." vember and made a follow-up visit in June. Last year was a particularly tough time for Strong's organ transplant program. Then-director Dr. Amadeo Marcos left in August for the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center.

Soon after, two other transplant surgeons left. The program is now run by Dr. Adel Bozorgzadeh. UNOS routinely conducts audits of transplant programs to guarantee that they comply with the agency's rules, spokeswoman Moore said. But again, the results of those audits and other peer reviews are not made public.

The idea is to provide confidentiality so that physicians will be honest, she said. University of Pennsylvania bioethicist Arthur Caplan said there are powerful pressures on transplant programs to compete for organs. "Transplantation is a lucrative thing for hospitals, but if you don't get the organs, it becomes a very costly program to have in place and not use it," Caplan said. "So I'm not surprised that given the ongoing shortage of organs, programs are doing everything they can to capture the business. "We're seeing more and more hospitals get into transplantation, but we're not seeing more organs, so I'm afraid that creates an incentive to manipulate the system." MLEINGANDemocratandChronicle.com the community, but I guess not.

I don't believe they're really losing money." Data from the city shows that the buying power within a one-mile radius of the Mt. Hope store is $25.6 million, which includes food, but also other grocery store items such as cigarettes. But Wegmans averages more than $50 million in sales a year from its superstores and, according to industry sources, some of the largest stores average more than $70 million a year in sales. Wegmans has expressed interest in building a superstore on the site of the former Rochester Psychiatric Center on Elmwood Avenue, but the company has not been specific about its level of interest. Fashun Ku, the city's commissioner of economic development, said Wegmans had not formally approached the city about the possibility of building there, "although in the past they have talked about it." "I don't think we can determine (if we would support) it unless we had more details," he said.

Wegmans would first have to approach the state (to purchase the land), then do a traffic impact study, "and the most important thing would be to get approval from (Brighton Town Supervisor) Sandra Frankel," because the parcel borders Brighton. Frankel has said she opposes a supercenter there. Wegmans also has made a concerted effort to expand outside New York and upstate Pennsylvania. It has opened superstores in New Jersey and the Philadelphia area and is planning locations in Maryland and Virginia. It also will open a second distribution center in the Pottsville, area.

But even as Wegmans has gone the superstore route, other grocers, including Wal-Mart, have moved in the opposite direction by opening smaller neighborhood stores. To wit, since Wegmans closed its smaller city stores, Tops Markets Inc. has opened smaller-format stores on West Avenue and Upper Falls Boulevard. The smaller stores aren't likely to replace the superstores or the supercenters, Perosio said, but "they do fill a niche or a void in the shopping experience." "Not everybody wants to or has the time to or the desire to shop in stores or supercenters," she said. Yen Koenders, 40, counts herself in that camp.

A technician at Strong Hospital, Koenders has made frequent use of the Wegmans around the corner. "Even though I live in Pittsford, (I don't shop there) because it's too big," she said. "Here it's almost like valet parking. I can park close and just jump in for 20 minutes," she said, referring to the Mt. Hope location.

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Hope Avenue customers to the Brooks-Chili store at 1885 Chili as long as there is demand for the service. But many people queried about the shuttle on Thursday said they probably wouldn use it. Natale, Wegmans spokeswo man, said that the company has received "a number of inquiries about leasing or purchasing" the Mt. Hope site, but adds that "a decision has not been made at this point." She also said that all of the 110 full-time and part-time workers at the Mt. Hope store have been offered jobs at other Wegmans stores.

Perosio said it is highly unlikely that Wegmans will either sell or lease the Mt. Hope location to another grocery store, especially since it says it wants to build a superstore nearby. "If they lease it out or sell it out, there will be restrictions for some noncompeting entity," Perosio said. Perosio doesn't think the closing of the Mt. Hope store will hurt the company in the long run.

"Typically, Wegmans has such a good rapport with its customers that for some period of time, if there is not a Wegmans close by, consumers will go to Tops or some other store," she said. "But I guarantee you once the new Wegmans is up, they'll go right back to Wegmans." LBECKERDemocratandchronic le.com FBILOViSDemocratandChronic le.com about $3 billion to acquire new companies over the next three years. That plan has chagrined at least some shareholders, who worry that Kodak is spending a lot of money shareholder money on an approach that has long odds of success. In that context, the meeting reflects a spreading dissatisfaction over the company's approach, a New York money manager said. "I wouldn't want to say it's major but a large population of investors are very upset," said Robert Jaffe of Force Capital Management in New York, which owns less than 1 percent of Kodak shares.

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discount $6, valid wilh olhcr offers or on Holidays. Expires llIW03 Kodak FROM PAGE 1A sales were moving past their peak as a result of the increasing popularity of digital photography. To cope, Rochester's largest employer said it would cut the annual stock dividend by 72 percent and invest more aggressively in new and existing fields such as consumer digital photography, commercial and home printing, display screens for consumer electronics and others. Kodak said it would fuel the new investment by spending Showroom DUG SfllE ETT7 1 Enclosures, inc. tion that it has to at least try to make the shift to digital, said Christopher Hayes, chief investment officer for Hayes-Fischer Capital Management in Rochester.

He likened the challenge to that of IBM which nearly went out of business with the creation of the personal computer but is now reaping big sales from computer-related services. "The question is, can Kodak do that, too?" Hayes said. Investors are probably separated somewhat by age in their feelings toward Kodak's strategy, said Richard Stice, an equity analyst for Standard Poor's Inc. in New York. Stice does not own Kodak shares.

Younger money managers probably support the strategy since it gives at least some hope of transforming Kodak into a growth company. Their older colleagues are probably op-, posed because Kodak just took away part of their cash cow in the form of a dividend, Stice said. As for Stice, he thinks Kodak faces severe challenges but is glad the company isn't meekly surrendering. "I prefer to see them doing what they have decided to do: Fight on and try to change," Stice said. "That way, they aren't giving up." Investors are probably a bit confused by Kodak's new approach, another analyst said.

"The thesis apparently is, they should be milking the company," said Ulysses Yannas, who follows Kodak for Buckman, Buck-man and Reid. "But you don't run a business like that. Imaging will not disappear. Taking photos will never disappear." BRANDDemocratandChronicle.com who blew the whistle on the alleged fraud in Chicago. "The system is built on the principle of trust, and if that trust is vio lated, everything falls apart." Strong performed 151 liver transplants in 2002.

It has done 89 so far this year. Organs are supposed to be distributed to the most ill patients first, with other factors such as blood type and size also considered. Strong discovered its prob lems last fall during an internal audit, Parrinello said. UNOS made a site visit in No Jaffe describes a Kodak acquisition spree as "highly risky and highly speculative." He said he would prefer that the company stick to the business as it is currently configured while tightly controlling its spending. With the money it makes, Kodak should then buy back stock, which would drive up earnings per share and the stock price, Jaffe said.

A second alternative, which Jaffe said he favors more: Split the company into two parts. One would house the film business and lucrative health imaging unit; the other would operate the company's new forays into digital imaging and other fields, as well as intellectual property. Under that approach, Kodak stock could be trading at 80 to 150 percent higher than it is today, Jaffe said. The idea behind both approaches: "You spent a fortune building massive technical base. Now make it work," Jaffe said.

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