Retail

Interior designs

By Mike Cottrill

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The Capó file

Pedro A. Capó was born into the furniture business.

Before he was part owner and chief operating officer at El DoradoFurniture Corp., Capó watched his father build it from the groundup. Today, Capó and his six brothers all share in the leadership of thecompany, keeping the family element prevalent in the retail furniturestore chain.

Of course, as the company has grown to $166 million, even a furniture-first family like the Capós can’t do everything themselves.And not everyone in the world has the natural feel for the businessor cares about quality the way the family does. So as the companyhas grown to 750 employees, Capó has had to get people to takehis family business as seriously as he does. That requires not onlygetting them interested in the family business but also using astrong sense of leadership to encourage people to get behind thecompany’s belief in professionalism.

“You have to be a visionary and know where to go and how to getpeople to follow you there,” he says. “And unless you have that,you can have the best product in the world, you can have the greatest organization in the world, but you always have to know whereyou are going to be as a company tomorrow, and you have to convince and entice — not necessarily sell — entice your whole teamto follow you there. The word is basically right there, you can’t bea good leader if you ‘manage.’”

So while El Dorado Furniture makes it a point to welcome peopleto the family when they join the organization, Capó makes the distinction on the traditional family business model, demanding professionalism and passion from each employee. That can get a lot harderas a company grows, so he makes sure the company hires right, trainspeople in full detail, gives people a chance to retrain if they fail, andthen if they show they can match the family quality, Capó gives thema chance to move up the ranks.