The lovely world of M&M's

      "It was very different", explains Kim Pascoe, a Global Financial Planning and Analysis Manager at Mars Corporation. Kim Pascoe, a very dependent and hard working Manager for the M&M's company. Kim has been an employee for Mars since May of 2008, working as an accountant, and moving up throughout the years to become a manager now in 2022. To the casual purple skirts and high heels on some days, to the jeans and T-shirts on most days, Mars allows any and every employee to wear what they please, to an appropriate extent, allowing even the dress down, like black adidas sweatpants and casual plain white shirts, employees can feel comfortable and appropriate for work. "Dress code is very casual, no one dresses up in business suit or ties, only for important events" replied one processing technician who currently works for the corporation. "Even the highest rank dress down during the occasion". 

    M&M's started all the way back in the 1920s when Frank Mars started delving into the business in 1911 from his home in Washington, and eventually launched the Milky Way chocolate bar with his son in the 1920's. M&M's were established in 1941 as a military ration made in Newark, which then moved over to Hackettstown, New Jersey in 1958 for a greater demand and more space to work and grow the business. Shortly after wartime quotas ended and the candies were made available to the general public, Forrest Mars bought out the company from Murrie, and took full ownership of the M&M's, seen on the brown bag package today, which was introduced in 1948. Two years after Forrest took ownership of M&M's, the candy began to be imprinted with the black "M" on it.

Figure 1

    When walking up the stairs into the big swinging door surrounded by magnificent looking statues of the M &M mascots, you enter into a room filled with wonders. Upon enter, an aroma of chocolate fills the air of the room, but not just any kind of chocolate, a chocolate that smells so fresh, sweet, and new  (See fig. 1). This smell circles around while you enter into a massive entrance room, with stainless glass windows and nicely placed wood floors. To the right  enters the check in station, with a wonderfully placed yellow M&M's stand filled with candy for one to take generously. Passing through the check in, you walk through the halls and meet one on one with the offices, but not just any kind of office, open space offices. Each cubical connected to another cubical like tables in a cafeteria, six inches apart from each other, with little to no wall splitting anyone apart. Sitting seven feet away from your coworker will be guaranteed, but still plenty of working room. Each office desk consists of triangular looking tables with all the essentials needed to work right in front of you. Workers all huddled at their desks, eagerly typing away at keyboards whilst chatting with one another about their day fills the room with distant murmurs. The sound of keyboards clicking, phone calls ringing, and workers laughing surrounds the office with the sense of enjoyment working for the M&M's corporation.

Luc Francillon, a rather tall, broad man, who looks intimidating from afar, but with a very contagious smile, can turn any opinion on him into a nice one. Luc, the big guy in the office, running as the CFO of Mars Corporation, runs any events that are important to the company, or even fun events for the staff. He even makes the staff feel like a family. Six pm on a cold afternoon night, Kim was finishing up some work in the office. John, a short man, with hair flowing down behind his back and a unique looking mustache, is sitting quietly next to Kim, working on a presentation for his upcoming meeting the following day. Kim looks up at the clock, only to realize that she has been working nonstop for the past twelve hours, without anything to eat in between. Once she realizes the time, Kim gets ready to pack up for the day, when she scans the rather unusual heap of bags sitting in the middle of the table in front of the two. (See fig. 2)

                                                     
                                              "What is with the bags?", questions Kim

     John, Looking up from his computer with confusion in his eyes, "I don't know, do you think they are for us?", he replies with a tone of excitement in his voice.

                                    "I hope so, because I am starving." Exclaims Kim, standing up from her desk.

    John gets up and slowly follows Kim over to the bags. "There's a note on the bags, it says, "Take one bag each"", Kim reads as she picks up the bags from the table.

                                    John picks up his bag is reads, "From your favorite CFO, Luc :)."

Figure 2

    The two of them each take their bags back to their desks and eat them while emailing luc to thank them for the food. Luc enjoys making his employees feel as if everyone there is part of a family, as well as the HR department. Each year, the HR department would organize a "fun" event for the office to engage in so that it isn't all about work. During Halloween there would be a pumpkin decorating contest, and each pod would get a pumpkin and have to think of a way to decorate the pumpkin. These are the little events that make the M&M's Corporation a family.

    Most of the time M&M's is a fun and relaxing place to work, but keep in mind it still is a competitive business, competing against other candy business to make more money. Meetings can get a little heated if the topic of the conversation is about loss of money. One spring afternoon, in an open office of the Mars corporation, a business meeting is underway. The main focus was supposed to be about the money being made from trade into Korea, but got sidetracked over to loss of money coming from Newark. Kim Pascoe, who was leading the meeting was addressing to the group, including Lauren Spranger, one of the General Managers at M&M's, about the prices in Korea when the conversation got heated. 

                                "Why don't we talk about the price dropping in Newark", cuts in Lauren

                                                    Kim replies, "I mean we can but-"

                    "Nonsense", snaps Lauren. "I think we need to discuss this problem now" she snarls, throwing her hands up in the air.

                            "Yes it is a problem, but we don't need to discuss it at the moment", cuts in Luc.    

"We can talk about this during another meeting, thank you Luc" sighs Kim, trying to get back on focus.

                            "Whatever you say boss", Lauren replies annoyingly, rolling her eyes, "we'll discuss the real problem another day".

            "Alright, lets just get back on task", Luc states, quickly looking back up at the presentation.

Figure 3

    The meeting continues at a smooth pace, after dealing with the obstacle, which could have ended a different way. Business can be fun at times, with the people and community surrounding you, but it still is a business, meaning problems will come along the way eventually, and will have to be dealt with at a professional manner. (See fig. 3)

    M&M's corporation runs a fantastic business, with a great community and very friendly people, always excited to meet and greet you into their lives. Between the exciting events, and fast-paced work environment, there will always be a person there to happily accept you into their family. Mars controls a fantastic company, including the candy they process and distribute out into the world. This is why I choose to call it,    "The lovely world of M&M's".