CHATTEM GUERRY FAMILY CONTINUITY ASSURED
Executive Summary
CHATTEM GUERRY FAMILY CONTINUITY ASSURED: Zan Guerry, exec VP and chief operating officer of the family-controlled company, has made the transition to chairman, president and CEO following the death of his father, Alex Guerry, on May 23 ("The Pink Sheet" May 28, In Brief). The elder Guerry was 72. The announcement of the younger Guerry's election to the topsider post was made June 4. Control of the the tightly held, publicly traded company appears to remain in the hands of the Guerry family and a small group of officers and directors. As of last October, the Guerry family, officers and directors of the company held over 47% of Chattem's outstanding common stock. Alex Guerry himself controlled almost 18%. Zan Guerry, 41, has been with Chattem since 1978, holding a wide range of management positions. He was a VP and the chief financial officer from January 1980 until his election as an exec VP in October 1983; he headed the consumer products operations from April 1984 to January 1989 when he was promoted to chief operating officer. Guerry relinquished his top financial post in April 1985 when John Bosworth was promoted to that position. In its 1989 fiscal year (its most recent full-year figures), the firm had sales of $68.7 mil. Concurrent with Guerry's promotion, Bosworth, 42, has been promoted to exec VP of Chattem and remains as chief financial officer. He has been with the company since 1980. The company's experiment with senior management outside the family went awry in 1988. Ex-Miles Exec VP George Davy was hired in late 1987 to take a senior slot between the two generations of Guerrys. Davy left Chattem in January 1989 and, at one point, was in arbitration over his severance package.