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Until Death, or Some Other Sticky Problem, Do Us Part

Hoping to rebuild the company's reputation, Daguin decided that opening a restaurant in New York City, a longtime dream, would help. The company tended to get good press only when it launched new products, she told Faison, which shifted too much attention to product development. Opening a new restaurant would address that issue and also further establish D'Artagnan's brand among consumers. It would have to be modest so it wouldn't compete with the company's restaurant clients, but it would sizzle with Gascon flavors. Especially when Daguin was able to line up outside investors, Faison thought it was an excellent notion. As did reviewers--The New York Times awarded D'Artagnan The Rotisserie two stars in July 2001, saying it "has so much personality, it can sell it by the pound."

But seven weeks later, it was September 11. New York's economy plummeted. And a year and a half after that, France opposed the Iraq war and French restaurants were spurned. While Faison spent his days in Newark, where D'Artagnan is headquartered, Daguin was now at the restaurant most afternoons and evenings. They both had to invest more money than they'd expected, and they began to argue about the venture. Faison believed Daguin had pitched it as a side project, and now he found himself going on sales calls for the main business in her place, since she was off at the restaurant all day. "She asked me for help

On Changing Directions

Theoretically they had a shared vision at the start, but if somebody's going to change the rules on you, it's a good idea to talk about it. They might have decided that she would start a different company to have her restaurant. --The Mediator with running the restaurant, and I told her, absolutely not, I had a job," Faison says. Daguin, for her part, thought that while he'd supported the restaurant initially, he was now showing up for a meal there twice a year. "We were in this together,"

On Determining Roles

I'm not clear that he was actually happy with the idea in the beginning. It doesn't look as though they had an agreement as to what Faison's role would be and what Daguin's role would be. Daguin says they were in this together--but was it her perception or was that reality? --The Marriage Coach she says now. "Why wasn't he in there more?" At the same time, she also figured, she loved running the restaurant, and "in some ways, if he had been there, maybe we would have fought about things unnecessarily." But the business never came back, and they agreed to close the restaurant in the beginning of 2004.

By that time, though, Faison had come to believe that D'Artagnan's problems extended beyond the restaurant. Daguin's salespeople were getting commissions based largely on sales, which were high, but his operations people were getting bonuses based on profitability, which was low. He also felt the company should focus on more profitable prepared products and restructure the restaurant-distribution business by instituting a minimum order size and cutting the number of routes. Daguin disagreed.

On Resolving Disputes

Either they weren't willing or didn't know how to resolve this. First, you'd clearly and specifically identify the problem--the real one here is, what if we don't agree about what business we're in or that profitability is the priority? Then you either resolve the problem or agree it's a tension you have to manage. So if it's Faison's preference that profitability is the priority, and Daguin's that we want to be influential in the food business, they could perhaps negotiate a level of profitability that's critical. --The Mediator We have no money for publicity, she said, so D'Artagnan gets into retailers only because they know chefs use us. Thus, when chefs need a duck breast in three hours, we must deliver it. Plus, without money for market research, she said, we need to know what influential chefs are ordering so our prepared products remain trendy.

The dispute festered. In November 2004, a competitor offered to buy D'Artagnan. The partners asked an investment bank about the offer, and the bank confirmed their sense that the price was too low. The partners rejected the offer, and Daguin assumed the talk of selling was over. "After that, he didn't talk about it anymore. I should have smelled something, but I didn't. I really didn't," she says.

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