First you build the team...
This principle is the force behind the growth of DAP
PETER FONTAINE didn’t know it 25 years ago, but he was destined to play a major role in the building of a dynamic auto parts company. After all, he was working behind the parts counter of his family’s single auto parts store in Central Florida, and even though he thought he was learning the parts business, he was really learning the people business.
"My father and brothers taught me one important guiding principle," remembers Fontaine. "If you want to build a business, you first build the team. Then the team builds the business."
The principle works...and it’s been the force behind the growth of Discount Auto Parts, which is based in Lakeland, Florida, a city of 75,000 people located between Tampa and Orlando.
"When my dad retired from the restaurant business," says Fontaine, "he used to help my brother Richard with a small auto parts store in Lakeland. Then he opened another one in Winter Haven and started selling to do-it-yourself customers." At the time, most of the auto parts business was jobber-oriented, and DIYers had to pay top prices. But Peter’s father changed all that by selling parts to DIYers at lower margins than the garages were paying. He called his store "Discount Auto Parts."
"After that, things just kind of grew," Fontaine says. His sister and her husband bought the first store and opened another. Later, Peter’s brother Denis, an attorney, joined the business. Peter, who worked in the stores during the summer, came on board after his graduation from Florida State University in 1975.
"By 1981 we had 18 stores, mostly in Lakeland, Orlando, Tampa and Winter Haven. We didn’t buy existing stores, but looked for older properties and rehabbed them." A big break came when 20 Aid Auto stores in South Florida came on the market. The Fontaines dipped into their emergency cash reserve and bought the stores. "We lost $500,000 in six months," says Peter.
The reasons for the losses quickly became clear, and led the company to its present phenomenally-successful team building philosophy. "When we bought the Aid Auto stores, we never realized that teamwork was such an important part of our success formula. The Aid stores didn’t have that culture. Their people were not team players. That experience made us realize that we were not only in the auto parts business. We’re in the people business. It’s really how we started to develop our team philosophy."
It didn’t happen overnight, but ultimately the people-building concept led to success. By the end of 1981, the company owned 40 stores. Expansion continued with the purchase of six Sunbelt stores in Jacksonville. The Team concept expanded, too, incorporating the concepts of "customers" and "ideas."
"We call it "T-C-I," Peter explains. "The T is for Team. First you build the team, and the team builds the business. C is for Customer. We want them for a lifetime. And I represents Ideas. We believe that there’s always a better way to do business...always a better way to serve the customer."
With the team as the cornerstone of the company, the Fontaines developed other practices which have contributed to the company’s success. For example, almost everyone in a management position has worked in a store or the distribution center. The company believes in promoting from within. "Everybody who works here knows that, with hard work, they can advance from team member to team leader, all the way through store manager to district manager. Even to vice-president. We’re not run by a bunch of lawyers, venture capitalists or a conglomerate. We’re run by people who know the business from the ground up. Quite a few of us started our careers behind the parts counter."
The company boasts a high retention rate of its management team. District managers have a 100 percent retention rate, and store managers are retained at a 90 percent rate. The company rewards this loyalty and fosters continuity with a generous stock option plan and a 401k profit sharing program.
The company’s emphasis on its people and their continuing development has been fostered by many people, both inside and outside the company. Fontaine credits a man he calls his "Coach and mentor."
"Herb Wardlow keeps me focused and centered on our people," Fontaine states emphatically. Wardlow, who was the first president of K Mart, is a retail veteran who constantly promotes training and promotion from within. He is a member of the company’s Board of Directors and offers a broad understanding of the competitive retail environment.
As president of a publicly-held company, Fontaine frequently finds himself talking to New York stock analysts. "I tell them we’re in a tough business. We’re not flipping burgers, here. You don’t learn this industry in two weeks. It takes at least a year to acquire an effective understanding, and longer than that to learn how to stay ahead of the customer."
Fontaine returns to his favorite theme, the company’s formula for success. "You need good people. In management, on the counter, in the distribution center. We owe our growth to our ability to attract and retain qualified and motivated team members. We’ve come a long way in 25 years, we have a long way to go, and there’s one thing I know for certain. My parents, Herman and Marie Fontaine, said it best. ‘If you build the team, the team will build the business.’
"There is no other way."
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