A Year in the Life of a Greeting Card - ' American Greetings Base Case'
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Headquarters: 1 American Road, Cleveland, OH 44144
Phone: (216) 252-7300
Business: Creation, design and sales of everyday and seasonal greeting cards, gift-wrap and related products.
Chief Information Officer: Bruce Petro
Financials: $2.4 billion of net sales in fiscal year ended Feb. 2002; Net loss of $122.3 million, or -5.2% on sales
Challenge: Streamline the management of products by digitizing creative materials, manage printing and production with computer systems, and link into retailers' information systems through bar-code scanning
BASELINE GOALS:
Turn inventory more than 2.6 times a year
Improve market share from 40% of "social expressions" (greeting card) market
Broaden customer base (five customers account for 37% of revenue)
Reduce debt, which totaled $853.1 million at end of fiscal 2002
Projects: Processes 
