By: Charles Slat story
Patrick H. Norton’s decision to leave La-Z-Boy Incorporated doesn’t necessarily mean the company will leave Monroe.
Rumors about the prospects the headquarters of the furniture firm might move out of town have circulated for years.
“I know there’s been that talk around, but I don’t see that happening,” Mr. Norton said Friday, shortly after his retirement was announced. “It wasn’t going to happen as long as I was here, that’s for sure.”
There might be some advantages to the company moving south, closer to the heart of the furniture industry, but he said, “Would it be worth the tailache to do it? No.”
“This is home base for this company, and I don’t see it changing,” he said.
He said he oversaw the move of Ethan Allen from New York to Connecticut when he was with that firm before joining La-Z-Boy. “I don’t need to do that again,” he said.
He also said he expects to continue to make Monroe his home, though he’s had a second home in North Carolina for years. “I feel Monroe will be my home for some time,” he said. “That’s my plan at the moment. I’m going to be here to be of any help that I can be.”
“It’s time to see whether the gang here is ready to fly on their own,” he said. “I’m going to be around as chairman emeritus and be of any help I can, but it’s probably time I devoted a little more time to my family and a few other things.”
He’s been involved with High Point University in High Point, N.C., as well as with Monroe County Community College, and serves on the board of a North Carolina-based fabric company.
He counted as one of his major accomplishments while with the company the establishment of the La-Z-Boy Furniture Galleries store system, which now numbers about 340 locations.
“This is a great company,” he added. “I really felt one of my responsibilities was trying to maintain the culture and philosophy of the corporation as laid down by the founders. If I succeeded in that, then I succeeded.”
Mr. Norton always has been mindful that La-Z-Boy’s fortunes can foretell the direction of the economy, largely because furniture is often purchased when buyers feel they can afford it.
“Things are not going well for us right now,” he said. “As I told my employees, this too shall pass. We were in the dumps when I came here in 1981. We’re in a very cyclical business and a lot of people don’t understand that. That doesn’t have a lot to do with the quality of the company or the quality of its leadership.”
With annual sales of about $2 billion, La-Z-Boy is one of the world’s largest residential furniture makers. About 450 of its employees work at the company’s headquarters in Monroe.
