It was a watershed moment for Paul Parker in 2011; he was just back from another business trip – 33 hours of travel each way for two days of meetings in India – when he looked over the Christmas decor in his South Carolina home and considered the wrapped presents for his two sons and realized, ‘I don’t know anything that’s here that I gave the boys.’ Worse, he worried his own kids barely knew him from being gone all the time for work.
Paul was then an executive, but an employee, the COO of an international company that he had been with for the past year. Prior to that he was with an apparel company that had 24/7 operations. He’d have a little jet-lagged time with his boys, one in eighth grade and one a freshman in high school, before heading back to the office for more work.
It wasn’t just the hours that drained him. In his apparel jobs over the previous 20 years he had had to relocate a lot of operations. “I was a part of moving a lot of business overseas and into third world countries. There’s two lessons I learned. One, in a lot of those countries they are the nicest, hardworking, sweetest people that need an opportunity. But, while that’s the case, it was heartbreaking closing the facilities in the USA.”
That 2011 holiday was great, and it highlighted how much Paul was missing his family’s lives. “I said, ‘That’s enough. I’d rather take the risk on my own and do my own thing.’ My wife, Leigh Anne, and I decided to do something different in life. It took a little while to find out what it would be, but family was definitely the focal point of making the decision to buy our own business.”
Paul and Leigh Anne found an opportunity to purchase a American company using only materials made in America that would – if it grew – create more American jobs. Paul said about the chance, “Man, that will be so fulfilling.”
THE NEW START
Paul and Leigh Anne decided back in 2012 to purchase Magnet America, the company that had created and popularized the “Support Our Troops” yellow ribbon car magnet in 2003. But the initial surge of sales that created the company had faded over the years, and by 2012 it was making little to no money. It was a big risk for the Parkers to invest in something that was not making a profit.
But they took that risk. They used their retirement money, got the rest from the bank, and set out to turn the company around. Paul said, “If I don’t make this work, we will have to start over. All over. So, there wasn’t a great back up plan. We went into it knowing we had to make it work.”
What made the company ripe for new owners and new strategies also threw curveballs. “It seemed every time we opened the door there was a new problem or an unexpected expense. When I say there were many nights I went to bed in the fetal position crying, and thinking, ‘What did I do?’ that is literal. I did that.”
CHRISTMAS 2012
Their plans worked. They turned the company around quickly
and started their pattern of 10% or higher growth every year since the purchase. When asked if Christmas 2012, the Parkers’ first as business owners, was a better time than in 2011, Paul replied, “Oh my stars! Yes, that’ll make me cry, it was wonderful… Leigh Anne and I went out and got the boys their gifts together. They were younger then, and it was fun doing the whole event with the family, whether it was the boys, the grandparents or the parents, just being involved with the family was just a wonderful, wonderful time. Again, I wouldn’t trade it for anything. Christmas was great but it’s not just that. It was the birthdays, it was being at every school event, some mornings getting up and taking the kids to school instead of Leigh Anne doing it. You know, making sure I was at every play or sporting event that they did; my oldest ran track and my youngest played soccer. Those were the highlights of the change.”
GROWTH
Things were better, but certainly not easy. “Being an entrepreneur is difficult.” Paul keeps the same work ethic he had before purchasing Magnet America, but he has more flexibility. “Now that we’re business owners, it’s not a lot different. Leigh Anne and I check on stuff daily even when we’re gone, but it is different because it’s ours, we have value in it. It’s not overly demanding but we check because we just know we need and want to stay in touch with our team… The pressure’s different, I’m not getting pulled into unrealistic, crazy stuff.”
Paul got to spend more time with his boys while they were still kids. “They now are in college. Caleb is a junior and Aaron is a sophomore. They’re doing well in the college. They still work for us part-time, and during summers when they’re home. It’s been a great family building block, and I wouldn’t trade the time or experience for all the money in the world. I believe my boys would tell you the same thing. They say the greatest thing I ever did was quit corporate and do something where we could all do things as a family. So, that’s been just a wonderful part of this experience.”
In 2012 the company was not profitable and employed eleven people in North Carolina. “But through a lot of perseverance and a great staff to work with over the last five years, we’ve seen victories and we’ve grown ten percent or more every year. We continue to grow, and we now have a staff of 28. people. We’re thankful to say, we’ve more than doubled the business since we purchased it.”