COMPANIES DOING AWAY WITH ONE LUNCH HOUR

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 15, Issue 20, 12 April 1950, Page 6

COMPANIES DOING AWAY WITH ONE LUNCH HOUR

American companies are studying a plan that would alter the “lunch hour” sj'-stem practiced generally by industry in the United States and which may interest similar New Zealand firms. Under the plan, morning and afternoon eating periods would take the place of the present lunch hour at noon. The idea results from recent experiments which indicate that the human organism does not work at its best under the traditional three-meal-a-day system. It does better if the same amount of food is distributed over four meals, studies show.

It is the expei’ience in industry, notes the magazine Business Week, that a workman produces more at the start of each working day and that his work output tapers off before lunch. After lunch he is again more productive, and in midafternoon he again slows down. Most companies feel that midmorning and midafternoon light refreshments would increase the efficiency of their workers but not to the extent that more leisurely lunch periods would. One of America’s largest department stores, Marshall Field and Co. of Chicago, in the State of Illinois, recently installed the new lunchhour system to keep certain sales counters fully staffed at noon, when business is heaviest.

Now, instead of an hour at noon and 15-rminute morning and afternoon rest periods, the sales people at these counters take 45 minutes sometime before noon and another 45 minutes in midafternoon. These employees, who participate voluntarily in the change, like it. By eating earlier in the morning, they avoid crowds at eating places at noon; in the afternoon they have enough time for another meal and also to conduct personal business.