Mow's attitude toward employees is paternalistic. Remarkably for a company
that is only 13 years old and has grown fivefold in the last five years, none of
his seven top managers has been with him less than three years. Three go
back to the very beginning. "I don't give up on people or countries," Mow
says. Incompetence is no justification for firing someone. "There are jobs for
the incompetent."
Mow recounts what he calls one of the most important lessons of his
career. It was his first day of work as a young engineer at Honeywell, and
his manager took him on a tour of the facilities. Pointing out a draftsman in
one corner of a large work area, the manager said, "See that draftsman over
there? He's just as important to me as you are." It's a simple story, not a
particularly great one as business stories go, but it is a story that apparently
has deep meaning for Mow. A silence follows, and somehow I find myself
moved by it. Mow would never say it, but I understand that he thinks of his
employees as his children. Loving them like a father, he doesn't feel the
slightest need to make a show of mock equality.
Fact is, two of Bugle Boy's employees are his children. Genevieve, 29, is
the advertising manager, in charge of a $24 million budget, one of the
company's biggest. Mow recalls that she was making $60,000 last fical year.
She started out four years ago at $25,000. Cathy, 26, started a year ago and
is making $25,000 as a production artist in the advertising department. Both
were hired at BBI only after having worked three years at advertising
agencies. "I let them know they wouldn't be welcome until they had tasted
life in the real world," Mow says.
The question naturally arises as to whether he is grooming his daughters to
succeed him. He is evasive, saying only that he doesn't believe in promotions
based on family ties. "They have to earn their stripes. It can be costly to put
someone who's not ready into a high position." He also points out that next in
line for the chairmanship is BBI president Vincent Nesi who runs the sales
and merchandising operation out of the company's Fifth Avenue office.
Prodded, Mow admits that he would be delighted if his daughters decided
they wanted to run the company. But he says it would take many years for
either of them to know the business and its customers well enough to run
it.
Between the two Mow thinks that Genevieve has more executive potential.
"Cathy is more artistic," he says. "I won an art contest in high school." But
Mow insists that he would not give preferential treatment to his daughters.
"They enjoy enough benefits just being my daughters," he says.
If he decided to retire next year Mow says he would first take the company
public, then put Nesi at the helm. "Actually my wife Rosa would be next in
line but she has no desire to run the company." Rosa, Mow's youngish second
wife, is Bugle Boy's executive vice-president in charge of import, a key
positition in any big American garment company. She is also president of
Dragon International, Mow's sole proprietorship agency which imports all
Bugle Boy products at a 4.5% commission. The two companies are so
integrally linked that one without the other wouldn't be a functioning
enterprise.
As much as Mow believes that cost-cutting is the key to operating efficiency,
he is not stingy. He shelled out $45,000 for the golf tournament and $75,000
to get Smokey Robinson to perform at a BBI function. "If I were a penny
pincher, I wouldn't have built these offices," he adds, meaning the sprawling
glass-and-concrete complex completed last year. "I wouldn't have Herman
Miller partitions in the administrative offices." The partititions and other
interior fixtures of the upstairs administrative offices cost $1.4 million,
clearly top-of-the-line merchandise. The employee cafeteria serves meals
prepared by Marriott Food Service, a distinct notch above the usual
big-company fare. Employees pay three dollars a head, a fraction of the
actual cost of the food. The working environment is far more gracious and
pleasant than in the average company, and there are no loiterers around the
water fountains.
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