In the wake of its decision to close down Terry's chocolate factory, Mike Laycock examines the structure of the US food giant Kraft.

IT is only when you look at the Kraft website that you realize just how small and relatively insignificant Terry's is in the company's global empire.

In the first quarter results for 2004, it is not even mentioned - not even in the sub-section headed Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA).

Chocolate Orange may be a household name in Britain, but it does not make it into this report - unlike Kraft cheese, Maxwell House coffee, Nabisco cookies and crackers, Philadelphia cream cheese and Milka chocolates.

The sheer size and scale of the business shines through on Kraft's website, with some startling statistics.

The company is the second largest food and beverage company in the world.

Around the globe, in more than 150 countries, it employs approximately 109,000 people. You can hardly go in a food store without seeing its food.

"We're there at breakfast, lunch and dinner, and anytime in between. You can find our brands at a French hypermarket, in a vending machine in Japan, or in any American grocery store," says chief executive Roger Deromedi.

The report also reveals how the Terry's closure is not the only one happening around the world.

"During the first quarter, the company announced the exit of five plants and the elimination of approximately 2,000 positions worldwide." Presumably, the "exit" of Terry's might show up on the second quarter's results.

The Kraft empire has been created in just a century. In 1903, James L. Kraft started a cheese business when, with 65 dollars in capital, a rented wagon and a horse named Paddy, he started purchasing cheese at Chicago's Water Street wholesale market and reselling it to local merchants. Over the years, that business has grown and grown, often through the acquisition of existing businesses, such as Jacobs Suchard in 1990 and United Biscuits, which included Terry's, in 1993.

Updated: 09:42 Saturday, April 24, 2004