Pensacola News Journal from Pensacola, Florida • 44

7 PENS ACOL A TNews Journal THURSDAY, DECEMBER 10, 1998 PAGE 8D To report i story. 435-8533 Takeover rumor raises Chevron stock price. Airline orders 125 new aircraft. Page 7D 1 CHET VjS-r. CURRIER v-r- Ticker Ljtak Community takes steps to form its own chamber tends to be disjointed.

There are few longtime residents By Jenny LaCoste News Journal staff writer Pace businesses are growing and owners say it's time they had their own voice in Santa Rosa County. Residents and business owners will meet tonight to lay PACE the groundwork for the Pace Chamber of Commerce. Ted Dotson, general manager of Pace Water System and chamber will do both." Milton attorney Angie Jones is researching area chamber charters and by-laws for the Pace group. Dotson said the chamber will seek incorporation. Tom Nichols, owner of a Pace engineering company, said Pace isn't a sleepy community along U.S.

90 anymore. "When I was in high school, I used to walk from Milton to Pace to see my girlfriend. You could go for half an hour without see have a voice in Pace," Dotson said. "I think this chamber will be a reality because everybody I've talked to really thinks it's time for it." Dotson said Pace is quickly becoming the most populated area in the county with an estimated population of 33,600 residents. "Milton is not giving Pace what it needs," Dotson said.

"Pace needs something to unite it and something to serve the businesses. The ing a car. Now I can't cross the highway out there." Nichols is also an advocate of incorporation for Pace, but he said founding a chamber is a separate issue. "I don't see the chamber as a step toward incorporation, but I think it would give us a. stronger voice if the community decides it wants to incorporate," Nichols said.

Because Pace has experienced such rapid growth, Nichols said, the community an organizer of the new chamber, said Pace has outgrown the reach of the Santa Rosa County Area Chamber of Commerce. "Gulf Breeze, Navarre, Jay they all have their own chambers," Dotson listed. "It's time that Pace had theirs." Dotson said the purpose of tonight's meeting will be twofold: to appoint a board of directors from a list of 25 volunteers and to set member rates. "The businesses need to an Shoppers scan their own groceries HI nil mi i imji wtiwi iflefrt rats $iliiH i 4 I Self-checking saves time, director says By R. Kevin Dietrich News Journal staff writer Most area consumers will get their first chance to scan their own groceries at the checkout lane beginning today, when the new Winn-Dixie Marketplace Food Pavilion opens on Blue Angel Parkway.

Customers will be able to use one of three fully automated checkout lanes at the store, believed to be the only one in the Pensacola area offering the service. "Young kids really love to use it," said Gary Pryor, location director for Winn-Dixie in Crestview, which began offering computerized self-checking in July. "It really speeds up the checking process, especially if you only have a few items." Winn-Dixie first tested the technology at a Jacksonville store last year and now has self-checkout lanes installed in more than 60 locations throughout the Southeast. "This store in Pensacola is an example of the kinds of advances we are making in the supermarket industry to make grocery shopping easy and convenient for customers," Winn-Dixie Marketing Director Gus Bergstrom, Montgomery, said. "It's very customer friendly.

In all the places we've had it, it's been very well received. "Each of the stores has a pricing manager and if there's a problem, customers can go check on it as soon as it's brought to light," Bergstrom said. Pensacola has seen computerized self-checking before: the Navy Commissary on U.S. 98 near Corry Station offered the service between 1987 and 1995 as part of a test program. "We had some people who absolutely loved it and others who wouldn't go near it," Commissary Officer Charles Ford said, adding there are no plans to reintroduce the systems supervisor, scans items when choosing the automated on Blue Angel Parkway.

the manufacturer can make it," Bergstrom said. Bergstrom declined to reveal cost for the new technology. Usage rates for the self-checkout lanes are similar to that of conventional checkout lanes at Winn-Dixie stores, Bergstrom said. The Blue Angel Parkway store will also have eight regular checkout lanes. '1 i- IMMHH9I fS 1 i a i 3 Bulls still set sights on 10,000 Approaching the end of a wild year of ups and downs in the stock market, Wall Street's bulls still have their sights set on a target of Dow 10,000.

That bull-market milestone is only a few hundred points beyond the record highs of set by Dow Jones's average of 30 blue chip industrials in July and November. Even with its recent step back below the 9,000 level, the average would need a gain of only 12 percent to 13 percent in 1999 to take it into five-digit territory. The Dow has done that well or better in each of the past four years. Indeed, analysts such as Thomas Galvin at Donaldson, Lufkin Jenrette Securities and Yale Hirsch, publisher of the annual Stock Trader's Almanac, talk up 11,000 as a possibility by the end of next year. This kind of optimism is by no means unanimous, however.

Many professional investors, including people who run some of the big stock mutual funds, say it's very dangerous to project the future as a straight line running out of the recent past. Too much too soon To their way of thinking, the market's dramatic comeback this fall from its late-summer selloff looked like too much too soon, putting stocks back on the same overvalued perch from which they fell in July and August. Along with misgivings about valuation, many observers worry that corporate earnings growth will be a lot weaker in the foreseeable future than the torrid pace about 13 percent a year, by some measures set over the past five years. "This has been the best period of profit growth in this century," said John Ballen, chief investment officer at MFS Investment Management in Boston. But Galvin at DLJ says he believes annual earnings growth can continue at 10 percent to 12 percent over the next three years, bolstered by such influences as technological progress and opportunities to make new foreign investments at attractive costs.

He also suggests that the so-called Y2K problem, involving the need to reconfigure many computers by the time the year 2,000 arrives, may have the beneficial side effect of increasing efficiency and productivity as it forces a general upgrade of computer systems. "We believe that as the consensus begins to ponder these factors, the bleak outlook currently shared by most will slowly dissipate," Galvin concludes. Bullish cycle Hirsch, in the 1999 edition of his annual almanac, argues that the market is moving into the most bullish part of the four-year political cycle, the year before a presidential election. "No pre-presidential election year has lost ground in 60 years," he says. His explanation for this pattern: "Electing a president every four years has set in motion a political stock market cycle.

Most bear markets take place in the first or second years after elections. Then the market improves. Most important of all for the bullish case, say analysts, is the recent series of three credit-easing moves by the Federal Reserve aimed at steering the economy clear of recession. Late last week, 11 European central banks also took steps to lower interest rates. "Life is good when central bankers are on our side," says Greg Smith, investment strategist "When central banks decide to provide more liquidity, they exert a powerful positive force.

There's every reason to believe that swift and significant action can prevent some of the economic problems that worried the world this summer from actually coming to pass." Chet Currier is a business analyst for the Associated Press. compared to those that live in shiny, new subdivisions, and there is little opportunity for a sense of community. A chamber of commerce, Nichols said, could help change that. "A chamber will draw Pace into a tighter circle," he said. "People will get the chance to know each other." Tonight's meeting will begin at 6 at Pace Water System on Woodbine Road.

U.S. current account The broadest measure of U.S. foreign trade Quarterly balance In billions of dollars Numbers are rounded Breakdown by category In billions Third quarter 1998 (Preliminary) All services $18.6 Merchandise trade Net unilateral transfers Investment income .5.5 Source: Department of Commerce Associated Press of trade, is still doing well. The government reported last week that the unemploy ment rate fell to 4.4 percent in November as big gains at department stores and other service industries offset weakness at factories. Wednesday's reports on the widening trade deficit and the Fed's survey of business conditions pointed to a dramatic slowing of the U.S.

economy and the need for further rate cuts in 1999, said Lawrence Chimerine, economist at the Economic Strategy Institute. Chimerine predicted that the central bank will cut interest rates at least two more times in the early part of 1999 to ward off a recession. a smile Wal-Mart's shopping list. But with more than 2,000 stores in the United States already, Wal-Mart sees its largest growth potential overseas, he said. The deal for the 74 German stores, which have around $1.7 billion in combined annual sales, will become effective Dec.

31, pending approval by government regulators. the move their parents. Maxwell has been with Sacred Heart for almost 25 years. She worked most recently in the Maxwell human resources department, and demonstrated her selfless attitude during Hurricane Georges, when she and her husband camped out at the hospital to supervise and care for children of employees called in to work. 1997 1998 II III IV II III $30tf f- d5146.7 i tts mm whj V.

1 rmm Farmers' troubles getting worse Associated Press WASHINGTON From corn to computers, America's exports are falling as the Asian crisis batters farms and factories. The broadest measure of the U.S. trade deficit surged to $61.3 billion, a fourth consecutive quarterly record. The Commerce Department said Wednesday the nation's current account deficit widened by 8.1 percent from July through September. Exports fell another $1.2 billion, reflecting the loss of major overseas markets.

The overall deficit would have been even worse except for a drop in the price of crude oil, which cut the country's foreign oil bill. So far this year, farmers have been hurt by declining exports of such products as soybeans, corn and wheat and by falling prices, reflecting the drop in worldwide demand. The nation's manufacturers, who have seen payrolls shrink by 245,000 jobs since March, are suffering steep declines in sales overseas of computers, semiconductors and machinery. In a separate report Wednesday, the Federal Reserve said its latest survey of national economic conditions found five of its 12 regions suffering from slower growth "mostly due to output declines in export-related industries." While the Fed has cut interest rates three times this fall to ensure that the widening global crisis does not push the U.S. economy into a recession, analysts said they believed the central bank will not cut rates again at its Dec.

22 meeting, given the fact that the overall economy, outside And when the day is done, they want to be appreciated by the stores where they spend their money." Martin said Wal-Mart is not stopping at Germany. "Our activities in the German market mark a start into a Europe-wide expansion," Martin said. He declined to say what European country was next on People on Karen Farinas 1 and Delores Maxwell have received Sacred Heart Health System's quarterly Louis de- Farinas Marillac Award. Farinas, a registered nurse in Sacred Heart's Neonatal Intensive Care Unit, was recognized for efforts to teach nurses about new procedures and for taking extraordinary measures to care for infants and li'ii i 1 1 ink Joseph Brown IllNews Journal on the automated checkout. HOW SCANNER WORKS Self-checkout lanes are equipped with computers that read product bar codes.

Customers scan merchandise and place it on a conveyor belt where lasers check and record prices against a master computer file. A cashier monitors the self-checkout lanes, assisting customers when necessary and accepting payment for purchases. The Winn-Dixie Marketplace Food Pavilion also features a deli, bakery, one-hour photo lab, pharmacy and floral shop, and will be open 24 hours a day. Based in Jacksonville, Winn-Dixie is one of the nation's largest supermarket retailers, with more than 1,150 stores in 14 states and the Bahamas. der of the Association of German Retailers.

"Competitors will either have to do the same thing or come up with their own new ideas." But Bob Martin, president and CEO of Wal-Mart International, said of shoppers, "they want a fun and friendly shopping experience." "They don't want to wait in long lines to buy merchandise. WIDELY HELD STOCKS Pet. YrPct, Stock Last 71 BellAtl 56Va BellSo 88Vw Disney 339i6 Chg. 4 Chg. 6.0 Chg.

15.8 23.4 56.4 1.7 20.8 24.9 22.7 69.7 61.9 -1 -1 V16 1 Vie 4.9 Exxon 73'Vw 1.0 GTE 65V4 GenElec 90 -7ie Intel 119316 -7e IBM 169716 1V4 0.7 Lucent 99 0.4 148.4 Merck 5Vt-63 43.3 Motorola 60Vie -'Vie 5.0 SBC Corns 49 -12 33.8 WalMart 76 7s 1.2 94.6 Stocks included are those held by the largest number ot accounts at Merrill Lynch. 4 John Hunter, Winn Dixie retail Shoppers will use this screen checkout lanes at Winn-Dixie service. Bergstrom said computer-literate users are able to adjust to the technology easily, Bergstrom said. "I haven't used anything like that before, but I think it would be a great time saver," said Janet Hurley of Pace. Winn-Dixie is currently adding the self-checkout technology to its new stores only.

"We're buying it faster than ly increasing its presence in Europe's biggest economy. Wal-Mart first entered Europe a year ago, buying 21 stores in Germany from the Wertkauf chain. Wal-Mart expects to bring an innovation German retailers have only started to discover: improving service. Market STOCK INDEXES Close Change Dow Jones Ind. 9009.19 18.79 Consolidated Volume 842,127,700 'Up 1,444 Unchanged 561 Down 1,550 20Tran.

3063.80 41.65 15 Utilities 306.75 0.96 118349 2.11 NYSE Composite 574.79 0.13 Amex Index 666 02 0.23 NASD Composite 2050.42 15.67 Russell 2000 401.96 0.48 GOLD AND SILVER Gold (Comex) $293.60 0.30 Silver (Comex) $4,744 $0,017 TREASURY BONDS Yield Change 30-year bond 4.98 0.01 Prime Rate 7.75 4 Wal-Mart says it will serve Germans with Associated Press BERLIN Germans used to high prices, rude sales clerks and long lines at the checkout are about to get a break: Wal-Mart is arriving with an American-style shopper-friendly experience. The retail giant announced Wednesday it is buying 74 superstores from the Spar supermarket chain, dramatical- Dow Jones Industrial Dec. 9,1998 Close: 9,018.97 8400 A 8300 9400 9300 9200 9100 f7f 9000 L'l 8900 8800 8700 i 8600 8500 The Germans do offer lower prices in their superstores known as hypermarts, but in a warehouse-like environment with little in the way of sales help and too few checkouts. Wal-Mart is opening its stores earlier, adding staff, offering more goods and putting more emphasis on product displays. "They are making things brighter," said Stefan Schnei summary NYSE St.

John Knits, up 4 at 2634 The maker of women's clothing and accessories received a proposal from a group led by CEO Bob Gray to buy all shares not owned by the Gray family fd) $28 a share. NASDAQ FNB Rochester, up 9 at 31 Vi Bank agreed to acquire the upstate New York bank for $129 million in stock and cash. Each FNB share can be swapped for either 0.06766 share of stock or $33 In cash. Micros-To-Mainframes, up 2332 at 22332 The provider of computer network products and services retained a New York Investment banking firm to assist in evaluating acquisition opportunities In electronic commerce and information technology..