"I thought I would get over [his death] in a year," Sue Ling Gin told the Sun Times in late 1993.
"Now I'm giving myself until June. But there's no question in my mind,
they were the 12 happiest years of my life."
At the time of his demise McGowan's
personal estate could probably be counted in the tens, or possibly even
hundreds, of millions of dollars. In addition to Sue Ling Gin, he was
survived by three brothers and a sister. To each of them he had bequeathed
a portion of his fortune. Sue Ling's share, Richard believes, probably
amounted to well under a hundred million, but was certainly enough to
support her in style for the rest of her life if she chose to stop working.
None of this estate seems to have been available for immediate use to help Flying Food Fare out of its
financial crisis. "It took a while to resolve all that," Richard says,
suggesting that Sue Ling and McGowan's siblings had difficulty divvying
up the estate. "I don't know if she has drawn from that or not." It
may simply have been that Sue Ling Gin resolved not to use her husband's
legacy to bail herself out of a business bind. If she had had a mind
to, she could certainly have sold some of the 15 or so properties she
had acquired over the years in the Haymarket district. As of late 1993
these properties were valued at about $40 million.
"She didn't sell anything," Richard says. "That's another business. She feels things have to stand
on their own two feet, can't just pour money into stuff. I can remember
those days and she didn't act like they had any extra money around.
Money was very tight for them." With son Calvin, now 26, working as
FFF's comptroller, Richard has had a fairly good read on the company's
financial situation.
"Everyone was really hustling," Richard says. That included Sue Ling running around trying to sell new
accounts. "She's very good at that kind of stuff, a very good salesperson."
"I'd go into staff meetings when
we had no [revenue] number projections and ask what the numbers should
be," Sue Ling Gin told the Sun Times in late 1993, "and [the
employees] had an answer! I was totally impressed.
"Our staff had a little success, so they'd try again. And again. And it worked. It was their company,
and they made it work."
[CONTINUED BELOW]
To avoid another Midway-type disaster
Gin decided not to put all her eggs in one basket. She restructured
FFF into three divisions to handle the newly diverse mix of clients:
the Chicago Board of Education, Cook County jails, Amtrak and a growing
roster of foreign airlines. FFF has kitchens at Midway Airport, O'Hare
and in Seattle. By the end of 1993 revenues had gone back up to the
$20 million level it had enjoyed before Midway's demise.
Gin is based out of the offices of New Management. During FFF's crisis she decided to build out a new
4,300-square-foot office space on Sangamon Street. To save money, she
asked Richard to do the job.
"It was a $100,000 job--that was the low bid," Richard says. "I brought
it in for $60,000 and we did it in about four months. That's the office
she has today." Working with Gin at the New Management offices is a
former banker who serves as Ginšs chief operating officer. He overseas
Calvin's work as FFF's comptroller.
By early 1993 FFF was doing sufficiently well to make Sue Ling Gin a desirable commodity on the corporate board
round-robin. On January 27 of that year she was named to the board of
Commonwealth Edison Co., a sure sign that she had acquired political
clout worth cultivating. "Sue Ling Gin is one of the most
successful entrepreneurs in the country," said James J. O'Connor, Edison
chairman and chief executive, considerably overstating his case. "Her
innovative style and diversified business background will make her a
welcome addition to our board." The most glorious feather in Gin's
cap came on July 2, 1993 when Bill Clinton invited her to join 10 other
business executives at a White House luncheon. The President wanted
input on how he was doing and what needed to be done. What is impressive
is the company in which Gin's name was mentioned--Motorola chairman
George Fisher, Caterpillar chairman Donald Fites, Treasury Secretary
Lloyd Bentsen, Commerce Secretary Ron Brown, Vice President Al Gore
and chief U.S. trade negotiator Micky Kantor.
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