Unit 1 Introduction- Business at work.
For this unit I have been asked to investigate a large business. The business I have chosen is Foxes Biscuits LTD, which is part of Northern Foods PLC.
Foxes biscuits were established in 1853 as a sole trader. .
The main areas that need to covered are the objectives of Foxes, the main functional areas, the management style and culture at Foxes, the use of ICT for internal and external communications at Foxes and how the production process and quality assurance/ control help Foxes to add value to it's products.
The advantages of a PLC are as follows: selling shares to the public can raise huge amounts of money, all members have limited liability, the firm continues if one of the owners dies, more power is enjoyed because of the larger size and the size means they can dominate the market.
The disadvantages of a PLC are as follows: setting up costs can be very expensive- sometimes millions of pounds, anyone can buy shares so people with outside interests can take control of the company, the company's accounts can be inspected by the public so competitors can gain an advantage by knowing their accounts, they are not able to deal with customers on a personal level as they are to big, their actions are controlled by various Company Acts which aim to protect shareholders, there may be a divorce of ownership and control which may ignore the interests of the owners and many PLC's are so big they become inflexible and may find change difficult. .
