Doc Buyers passes torch
at Big Island macadamia
grower

Dennis Simonis, the president
of ML Macadamia, will become
the company’s chief executive

John W.A. "Doc" Buyers, a longtime Big Island businessman who has run the state's largest macadamia nut grower for more than 25 years, has stepped down as chief executive officer of ML Macadamia Orchards LP.

He has been replaced by Dennis Simonis, the company's president and chief operating officer, effective immediately, the Hilo-based company said yesterday. Buyers will remain as chairman of ML Macadamia.

Simonis will shed the title of chief operating officer, and the position will remain unfilled.

Buyers, who has loomed large over Big Island business since he first took the helm of former Big Five company C. Brewer & Co. in 1974, says he wants to devote more time to other projects, including his plans for an assisted-living home for seniors in Hilo.

"I'm trying not to work as hard as I have. I've been working too hard my whole life," said Buyers, 76.

Simonis has been with the company since 1993, has served as president for three years and has steadily taken over management of day-to-day operations.

He takes over at a critical juncture in the company's history. A world shortage of macadamias and the nut's favorable health rating in the Atkins diet era have pushed demand beyond the capacity of growers.

At the same time, competing nut growers in Australia and South Africa are poised to push for an increasing share of the world supply market.

Simonis called the outlook a "tremendous opportunity."

He said 20-year supply contracts for 75 percent of the company's business with its sole nut buyer, Mauna Loa Macadamia Nut Corp., expire at the end of 2006 and that ML Macadamia expects to negotiate more favorable contracts in the future.

Under current contracts, ML Macadamia is selling nuts for about 50 cents a pound, he said, compared to open-market prices of about 85 cents per pound.

"There's going to be a lot of demand for those nuts. We'll be in a very good position," he said.

Simonis acknowledged, however, that Hawaii will need to more aggressively market its nuts in the future to counter expected competition from other countries.

After 12 years running C. Brewer, one of Hawaii's oldest companies, Buyers led a $200 million leveraged buyout of the company in 1986 and got ML Macadamia listed on the New York Stock Exchange. In 2001, he and his backers in the buyout agreed to liquidate C. Brewer and sell off its assets, including Mauna Loa, a nut processor and marketer .

Buyers bought some of those assets himself, including all the stock in ML Resources Inc., the managing partner of ML Macadamia.