TIES, TOFFEE AND TINY MINTS Let me give you an example. Joe Lanzilli was a VP at DL Clark. We went to call on a customer and then Joe suggested that we go to East Boston, his home—to have lunch. He took me to this crazy restaurant where the owner would cut off your tie if you didn’t eat everything on your plate. Now, back in the day, I thought I was up to the challenge. We ate everything we could and there was one sausage left over. Joe told me that I had to eat it. I just couldn’t, so Joe told me to put the sausage in napkin and put in my pocket. Little did I know Joe had gone into the kitchen, told the owner that I was hiding a sausage in pocket. Wouldn’t you know, Tony came to the table asked us if we liked our meal, and then asked me what was in my pocket? You know how that ended, off with tie. After the embarrassing moment and a lot of laughs, we went back to the office and fell asleep on the floor because we were so full. While we are on the topic of Joe Lanzilli, in the mid 1970s Joe went to work for Callard & Bowser. He called me when he landed there and when I first saw his new line, I told him that I didn’t think it is for us. After threatening to take me to that restaurant in East Boston again, I agreed to take it. We introduced the line to the market with their English toffee. The strategy was to entice the buyer to put the product in at a price it would sell. The manufacturer would C H A R AC T E R S W H O B U I L D C H A R AC T E R • 53