Marketing Masters [antikvár]

INTRODUCTION: DEFINING BEST Any fool can paint a picture, but it takes a wise man to sell it. —Samuel Butler (1835-1902) In this book we have profiled more than three dozen companies from the well known, like Rubbermaid and McDonald's, to the obscure. If these are, indeed, America's "best" companies, what constitutes best? Is it size? Sales? Earnings growth, stability, stock growth, corporate ethics, efficiency, financial strength, management, or industry standing? Best, by its very nature, defies objectivity. Best is essentially what's best in the eyes of the beholder, but in Marketing Masters, Ed Lawler and I have followed some specific criteria while casting a wide net. In my earlier book. The 100 Best Stocks to Own in America (rev. ed., 1991), I defined best as a combination of stock growth, earnings growth, dividend yield, and long-term consistency. Companies were carefully screened for financial performance over a full decade and ranked methodically from one to one hundred based on a preset scoring formula. Best had a clear purpose: What well-established, publicly traded companies had made the most money for investors? In Marketing Masters, we are trying to serve a broader purpose, although we have included some of the top companies from The 100 Best Stocks. Rubbermaid, McDonald's, Medtronic, Tyson Foods, Newell, Pitney Bowes, Stanhome, Automatic Data Processing, and Walgreen were all featured there. Many others from that list would