They are driven by the bottom line - like most big companies in this country.
ALL companites regardless of size are driven by bottom line despite what the officials may tell you. ALL companies.
They can easily buy out any of their competition and control the market.
Yes, they can. In the case of Natura, they weren't big enough to be competition. P&G's competition in the dog food arena is Ol' Roy, Purina, etc. The other little companies are not a blip on the radar screen. They mean nothing to P&G's bottom line.
They could care less about the mom and pop operations they consume - or what the product is they produced. Their main driver is to maximize profits - period.
Again, the same with every company. Believe it or not, Natura was exactly the same. Natura execs decided that the way to maximize profits was to sell a high end product in botique stores so that is what they did. Natura execs were smart enough to know they couldn't compete with the big boys.
Dog food is a widget and if I can produce the widget cheaper, then my bottom line is bigger. And we all like bigger bottom lines! It's America - the Company President is happy, the Board of Directors are happy, shareholders are happy, and we all win. It doesn't matter what we did to the widget, we made more money.
So tell me a company that's not like that. I have also worked for small companies, even owned a couple and I can tell you for certain, bottom line was the central focus of every major decision. If its not going to increase the bottom line, they don't do it.