Hershey's biggest dud is its new computer system

Just a few days before the biggest candy binge of the year, the Great North Foods warehouse in Alpena, Mich., displayed empty shelves where there should have been Hershey's bars. Reese's Peanut Butter Cups were missing, too. So were Rolos. The trouble: An order for 20,000 pounds of candy that the regional distributor had placed with Hershey Foods Corp. (NYSE:HSY) in mid-September hadn't arrived. Great North earlier this week had to stiff 100 of the 700 stores it supplies on candy orders it couldn't fill. Only Thursday did a Hershey shipment show up at Great North -- the first in five weeks -- and the distributor still didn't know if Hershey had sent enough to meet its needs. Full story. --Wall Street Journal

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