Featuring:

• A sneak peek at Ari’s forthcoming book, Zingerman’s Guide to Good Leading

• The inside scoop on Zingerman’s “secret” Southside location

• Ari’s search for the Imperfect Burger

• Camp Bacon, Cake tips, Kerrygold and more!

Download:May Jun 2010 WEB

Meet the Bacons! 

Join us for a Bacon Celebration like no other at Zingerman’s Camp Bacon on Saturday, June 19. We’re bringing together bacon lovers under one big tent at our Southside location for a day full of flavors, history and fun as we explore the best bacons we can find and learn the stories behind them.

• We’ll have Herb Eckhouse from La Quercia in IA, Allan Benton from Benton’s in TN and Nick Spencer from Spencer’s Jolly Posh British & Irish Foods in Chicago to discuss their work curing pork and Megan Dorsch from Nueske’s in WI will also join in the fun.
• James Beard award winning cookbook author Molly Stevens will provide a cooking demo
• Ari will lead a comparative tasting of great bacons (and maybe some not-so-great ones so you really CAN taste the difference)
• Jan Longone from the UM’s Longone Culinary Archive will speak on Bacon history

Plus, games, prizes, bacon poetry reading and more!

Registration for the day is $150 and includes breakfast, lunch, a Camp Bacon t-shirt and a signed hardcover copy of Ari’s Zingerman’s Guide to Better Bacon.

Online registration at www.zingermanscampbacon.com or call 888.636.8162 to sign up!

• Ari on what makes great pasta great

• An Interview with Zingerman’s Coffee Company managing partner Steve Mangigian

• Locally raised meat at Zingerman’s Roadhouse

• Easter and Passover specials

• Michael Pollan coming to Zingerman’s Roadhouse, April 11

Download the Zingerman’s Newsletter for March-April 2010

This week, Zingerman’s Training (aka, ZingTrain) was profiled in Crain’s Detroit Business Weekly!

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No secrets: Businesses find it pays to open books to employees

Private businesses have traditionally operated from the top down — executives passing along only the information deemed “safe” for employee eyes.

But that’s not the case for the nine companies in Zingerman’s Community of Businesses in Ann Arbor.

Owners Ari Weinzweig and Paul Saginaw practice open-book management, the business practice of sharing financial and decision-making duties among all employees.

“Our employees really get a chance to participate in the business,” Weinzweig said. “They are learning how to manage money and how to run a business.”

It’s the employees who manage expenses, monitor operating margins and develop new products. This opens a new realm of business transparency, one that can eliminate the “us vs. them” mentality between management and employees.

Private companies are known to hide net profits and keep books closed to protect competitive advantage, said David Brophy, finance professor and director of the Center for Venture Capital and Private Equity Finance at the University of Michigan‘s Stephen M. Ross School of Business.

“I think it’s amazing that a company is willing to do this,” he said. “It shows they have tremendous confidence in their ability and have obviously learned the positive gains exceed the potential risk of revealing trade secrets.”

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Read the rest of the article here and, to learn more about ZingTrain and our Fun, Flavorful Finance Seminar, click here.