THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Wednesday, September 21, 1994 TAG: 9409210374
SECTION: BUSINESS PAGE: D6 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: ASSOCIATED PRESS
DATELINE: BALTIMORE LENGTH: Medium: 67 lines
The number of black managers hired at the Denny's restaurant chain increased 56 percent last year while the number of minority-owned Denny's stayed the same - one.
A year after the corporate owners of Denny's signed an agreement with the NAACP, officials with both groups say progress has been mixed toward meeting the agreement's goal of creating business and job opportunities for blacks.
Officials with Flagstar Companies Inc., and the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People signed the agreement last summer following discrimination complaints against Denny's restaurants in Annapolis, Md., and San Jose, Calif.
Flagstar named its first black member of its board of directors, and 103 out of 124 new minority hires in management and executive positions during the past year have been black, company officials said. The black management hires represent a 56 percent increase from previous years, according to NAACP figures.
The company said it signed new corporate purchasing contracts worth $21.3 million with 19 minority-owned suppliers. That's about 3.5 percent of corporate purchasing, but is far short of the company's goal of $90 million.
Fred Rasheed, the NAACP's economic development director, said the goal was unrealistic. ``They had never done as much as $500,000 with minority firms. So how are you going to go from $500,000 to $90 million in a year?'' he said.
The Spartanburg, S.C.-based company also contributed $250,000 to minority groups. The agreement's goal had been $100,000 in contributions.
The agreement called for eight new minority-owned restaurants by the end of 1994. But the only black franchisee lost his Los Angeles store earlier this year. In June, a black employee took over a franchise in Beaumont, Texas, making it the only minority-owned Denny's in the nation.
Increasing the number of minority-owned franchises is crucial ``because this is an area that will help us to get into the economic mainstream of the country,'' Rasheed said.
By year's end, company officials said they expect to conclude Denny's franchise agreements that would result in seven new black owners, operating 32 restaurants.
``We've made a very sincere effort in a relatively short period of time,'' Flagstar Vice President Coleman Sullivan said. ``I think the numbers indicate that we are at least moving forward.''
The company is still being criticized at the local level.
Annapolis Councilman Carl Snowden said Flagstar's promise to find a minority owner for the Denny's restaurant where Secret Service agents allegedly were denied service in 1993 didn't materialize. ``The bottom line is, it was a great public relations campaign but it didn't really produce anything,'' Snowden said.
In San Jose, Calif., the site of the first discrimination complaint against Denny's, the president of a black businessman's group said Flagstar rebuffed the group's efforts to get work with the company.
``What they are doing is spending money giving it to black consultants. But in terms of Denny's economic commitment to black people . . . that's a fake and a fraud,'' said Ron McPherson, president of the Santa Clara County Black Chamber of Commerce.
KEYWORDS: DENNY'S NAACP by CNB