THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, July 2, 1995 TAG: 9507010406
SECTION: BUSINESS PAGE: D1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY STEPHANIE STOUGHTON, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: NORFOLK LENGTH: Long : 170 lines
J. Douglas Perry, chairman of Dollar Tree, will talk about his employees and his company's expansion. He'll chat about the competition and the trade wars. He'll detail the company's history and its future.
In fact, he'll talk about anything - but himself.
The same thing goes for Macon F. Brock Jr., CEO and president, and H. Ray Compton, chief financial officer and executive vice president.
The three Dollar Tree executives have kept low profiles in their sleepy corner of Norfolk. In an age of overfaxing and junk mail, they've molded the company into a retail anomaly. Dollar Tree has no public relations department and rarely releases news statements. Its headquarters, tucked inside a corner of Norfolk's industrial park, is marked by a small sign with the company's simple bushy-tree logo.
You might dismiss the company if it weren't for the accelerating figures on its balance sheets. The Norfolk-based firm had sales of $231.6 million and more than 400 stores last year, making it the biggest dollar retailer in the nation.
The company, which sells everything from beauty products to toys for $1 each, went public in March with an initial offering of 2.5 million common shares. The shares, offered at $15 each, had been owned by existing shareholders.
On Friday, Dollar Tree stock hit a high at 2678. It closed at 2612.
The three executives who have pushed Dollar Tree to the top of the $1 discount business do a good job of keeping all that quiet.
``It's pretty deliberate,'' Compton said. ``It's how we're comfortable.''
This low profile is certainly not for a lack of personality. Employees and colleagues say Perry, Brock and Compton are far from boring.
What they have in common is work ethic: All three are workaholics who are known to deal fairly with workers and vendors.
That's where the similarities end.
Compton is pleasant and even-tempered, a brainy, fatherlike figure. Perry and Brock - the entrepreneurs and co-founders - can be more boisterous.
Perry, 47, the youngest of the three, works hard and plays hard. When he's not out of the office looking for new store sites, he often walks into employees' offices just to chat. Tan and stocky with sun-touched brown hair, he sits back in his chair, mostly serious but sometimes joking about himself and ribbing his colleagues.
Brock, who tours the world sniffing out new markets and merchandise, looks distinguished with his glasses and combed-back dark hair. The 53-year-old executive is also known to be aggressive.
``He's charming and he's astute,'' said John Hartley, a vendor from Raleigh. ``He's a very fair businessman.''
Depending on whom you talk to, Brock is either charming or intimidating. He's a former Marine captain and U.S. Naval Intelligence agent.
Brock and Perry founded Dollar Tree in 1986. But it was Compton who sorted through the finances to help the corporation expand more rapidly and efficiently. He was with K&K Toys from 1979 to 1991, when the toy chain was sold. Dollar Tree then reeled him in.
``Doug and I both were more of the entrepreneurial spirit,'' Brock said. ``Ray was our savior.''
Over the years, the three have divided up the duties. Brock now goes abroad to find new sources of merchandise. Perry finds sites for new stores. And Compton crunches the numbers to make sure the company can afford these things.
Compton, 52, settled quietly into his place in Dollar Tree's corporate culture. To this day, many employees say they enjoy working for him but ``can't figure him out.''
He is an unassuming, bespectacled, dark-haired man. Compton steers the conversation from himself. He ducks out of one interview and brings in three of his employees: Darcel Stephan and two other vice presidents.
``These are really good people,'' he said. ``These are the people who help make this company work.''
Dollar Tree's foundation was built of bricks laid by Perry's father, Kenneth R. Perry.
Ken Perry owned several barber shops and properties before he moved into the five-and-dime business, buying the Ben Franklin store in Norfolk's Wards Corner.
``He was always willing to change, to try something new,'' Brock said.
At the K&K 5&10, Ken Perry's son, Doug, and Macon Brock worked together, getting a taste of the discount variety business.
Their variety store spawned K&K Toys, which grew into a 136-store chain before it was sold to Melville Corp. in 1991.
Meantime, Ken Perry's adventurous prodigies had grown their Dollar Tree venture from five stores to 172 in just five years.
He left them with these rules: Always be honest, always pay your bills on time, be conservative, have good credit.
``They are honest people,'' said Hartley, the Raleigh vendor. ``Whenever I have closeout (merchandise) that fits Dollar Tree's criteria, I'll send them a fax about the opportunity. Even if they don't want it, they'll always acknowledge the fax. Every time.
``No one else does that.''
Dollar Tree's employees rarely leave the company. Although corporate headhunters have sought several Dollar Tree employees, the workers say they doubt they will find a better job somewhere else.
Some employees have left, only to return, said Stephan, vice president of information systems.
``I hopped from job to job before I came here,'' she said.
She likes her autonomy at Dollar Tree, her ability to move at her own fast pace. Shortly after she was hired, she set up the company's computer, replacing its outdated predecessor. The new computer arrived, and she installed it.
``I could create a shop and be there before the computer got there,'' she said. ``It was exciting.''
Dollar Tree also tries to retain employees with regular incentives like strong retirement and benefit packages. The extras include merit-based bonuses, employee stock purchase plans and service awards.
What employees really relish is the opportunity to move up in the company. While Dollar Tree might consider outside applicants, it usually sticks to the people inside the company.
Take Bryan Bagwell. He began working for K&K Toys, Dollar Tree's predecessor, in 1977 as a distribution center associate. Essentially, he worked in the warehouse. Today, he's vice president of merchandise for Dollar Tree.
``They have always promoted from within,'' Bagwell said. ``They have always treated us well.''
Employees say they wonder what will happen when one of their executives leaves Dollar Tree.
``What's good about them is how they balance each other out,'' Stephan said.
In the company's registration statements, Dollar Tree wrote that the company's success mostly hinges on the leadership of its senior management team, particularly Perry, Brock and Compton.
``While the company believes that its senior management team has significant depth, the loss of services of any of the company's executive officers could have a material adverse impact on the company,'' according to the company's stock registration filing to the Securities and Exchange Commission.
Perry disagrees.
``It's inevitable,'' Perry said. ``If one of us left, it wouldn't be a big deal. The company would still run just as good.''
Then he laughs.
``Maybe better.'' ILLUSTRATION: TAMARA VONINSKI/Staff color photos
Shoppers stroll by the Dollar Tree store at Waterside in downtown
Norfolk. The Norfolk-based retailer had sales of $231.6 million last
year. It went public in March, with an initial offering of 2.5
million common shares.
Dollar Tree President and CEO Macon F. Brock Jr. checks out
merchandise in a mini-prototype store at the company's headquarters
in Norfolk. The prototype holds samples of Dollar Tree's
merchandise.
This Christmas item is among Dollar Tree's latest merchandise.
Photos
TAMARA VONINSKI/Staff
Worker Charles Wessman moves boxes of merchandise at the Dollar Tree
warehouse. The company is based in Norfolk's Industrial park.
JIM WALKER/Staff
Left: J. Douglas Perry, chairman of Dollar Tree, locates sites for
new stores. Perry helped found the discount company in 1986.
TAMARA VONINSKI/Staff
Right: H. Ray Compton, chief financial officer and executive vice
president, has settled quietly into his place in Dollar Tree's
corporate culture. He and other top executives have kept a low
profile as they've pushed their company to the top of the $1
discount business.
by CNB