T O P 2 O

BY MICHAEL McLARNEY
TERRY DAVIS,
CEO OF HOME
HARDWARE
STORES LIMITED
Meet the new boss. Definitely not the same as the old boss.
I
’d known Terry Davis for many years by the time he’d become
head of marketing for Canada’s largest co-op home improvement
group. So that day, a few years ago, while interviewing
him at a Home Hardware Market, I was a bit surprised to see that his
hair was dyed completely white. Not a look one expects to find at the
otherwise conservative head office of Home Hardware Stores Limited,
tucked away in the charming little town of St. Jacobs, Ont.
However, Davis was proving himself one to watch, and in more
ways than one. Despite a hint of the unconventional, he continued
to rise up in the ranks of the organization, working in a range of
roles. Now, after more than 40 years at Home Hardware, he’s got
the top job at a company that ranks as this country’s third-largest
retail home improvement organization by retail sales.
He’s only the third CEO in the company’s history, which this
year marks its 50th anniversary. The original CEO—and company
co-founder—Walter Hachborn, turned the reins over to Paul Straus
in 2010, but less than five years later Straus was ready to step back,
and Davis was heir apparent.
While Hachborn had the charisma and larger-than-life presence
to build, then hold together, an organization that now numbers
more than 1,000 dealers across Canada, Straus was the stable father
figure who held the organization together during its next phase of
increasingly aggressive growth. In some ways Straus embodies all
that is good and true about Home Hardware, and while a twinkle
would appear often in his eye, his humour was reserved for those
who know him best.
34 THIRD QUARTER / 2014
Hardlines Home Improvement Quarterly
www.hardlines.ca