Editor’s Note: CNY Executive Q&A is a feature appearing regularly (about every month) in The Central New York Business Journal, authored by guest writer Jeff Knauss, who is president of his own digital-marketing firm. In each edition, Jeff chats with a different executive at a Central New York business or nonprofit, with the interview transcript appearing in a conversational Q&A format.

In this edition, Ispeak with Jay Yennock, owner of China Towne Furniture and Mattress, located on Milton Avenue in Solvay. China Towne’s familiar slogan is “The One Big Store in Solvay.” Jay lives in Camillus with his wife, Darla. They have two daughters, Michenzi, who just graduated from the University of Tampa, and Morgan Marzano, who joined China Towne in 2013 and is learning the family business.

JEFF: China Towne is a very interesting name. Can you tell me where the name came from and provide a little history about the business?

JAY: I get asked that a lot. In fact, we talk a little about our name in one of our newest commercials. My dad [John Yennock] owned a kitchen-cabinet factory in downtown Syracuse. The main store here in Solvay started as a China factory that manufactured dishes for almost 100 years in the late 1800s, until management eventually closed up, left all the dishes, all the equipment, and locked the door. My father bought the leftover dishes and sold most of the equipment in an auction. Because there were still a few China pieces around, he started selling the dishes and called it China Towne. He purchased the building and leased the rest out to Allied Chemical. That’s how we got our name “China Towne.”

JEFF: What attracted you to taking over the business? Was it something that you always knew you wanted to do, or was it a career decision you made over time?

JAY: You know, growing up in a family business, I had it different than most kids. At 10 years old, most of my friends went and fished, whereas I went to work with my dad. I got involved doing whatever needed to be done, but I was also playing all the time. A lot of times, there were dishes that needed to be thrown away, so I would spend my weekends breaking dishes. It was a ton of fun.

So growing up, I was involved in every aspect of the business. After I finished college in 1984 [with a bachelor’s degree in business administration and marketing from SUNY Brockport], I decided that my heart was in the business and I started full time. I was involved in construction on the store, advertising, purchasing, selling merchandise, stocking the store, and basically whatever needed to be done.

JEFF: What do you like most about being a business owner?

JAY: The challenge, the change, creating something, and advertising the business. On a really good day, the most rewarding thing is seeing all the customers coming in and being happy with what you have in the store. They get their items delivered and are happy with their service. That’s what it is all about. 

JEFF: What’s the biggest challenge that you have as a business owner?

JAY: When things don’t go well, that’s the biggest challenge. Also, when there’s a drop in business, you have to think and act quickly to make changes and bring your business back up.

JEFF: If I were to ask your employees what your leadership style is like, what do you think they would say?

JAY: I would hope they would say that I try to lead by example. I like to help people make informed decisions. I think they should know exactly what’s expected, what the parameters are to make any decision that they need to make, and if they make a decision that maybe I disagree with, we just talk about it. I ask, “How could we do that better? What was the outcome? Was it what we expected?” I like everyone to be on the same page for what is expected. Today, we have a really great team of 28 employees that are always striving to deliver a great customer experience. 

JEFF: How long have you led China Towne as the owner of the business? 

JAY: There was never really a date. There was never any hand off here, saying, “This is yours now.” I guess in 1984, I walked in, I came into the business full time … as vice president. At that time, I had enough experience to do media buying. I had enough experience to do purchasing, hiring, firing, and a lot of tasks. As the years went on, I took on more and more responsibility, and I guess in December 1990, when my dad passed away, that would be the passing of the torch for China Towne. But I had been heavily involved with the company’s decision making since 1984.

JEFF: Talk a little bit about China Towne’s culture. How has it evolved over the years and what steps have you taken to grow your vision of the culture of 

China Towne?

JAY: My father started the business basically because we had dishes we had to sell and he was a true entrepreneur. He really liked to work at the business, and the details of the leadership roles were a little vague. When employees worked for the store back in the ‘70s and ‘80s and they wanted to take a day off, he’d say, “Just take a day off.” You want a raise, and he’d say, “We’ll talk about it.” So as time went on, I could not break that very loose culture. So we developed an employee manual. We created over a year’s worth of systems describing how we do things, how we define what we do, so that we would get the outcome we wanted. I think that was my direction with the business.

I just felt like I needed to surround myself with better people to bring the business to another level. In order to do that, people needed to know what they could expect from me to work here. We also needed to know, from their perspective, what I needed to do for them. I had a consultant help us with this process. The number one thing that we needed to do to make people feel that I cared about them was to put hot water in the building.

JEFF: Really, the number one thing?

JAY: It was number one. I said, “Hot water? What’s the problem?” 

The employees told me, “You got to have hot water. People need to wash their hands.” I said, “All right, but that’s going to cost $1,000.” “But you’ve got to spend it,” they said. So we put the hot water in and that was miraculous. Everybody liked it.

It was so funny to me because I never really thought about that. We also discovered that we needed to communicate our expectations and I needed to give more praise to the employees. I grew up with the attitude that, “Okay, we got that job done. Let’s move on to the next one.” 

JEFF: How has the Internet changed the face of the business and what are you doing to stay ahead of the curve?

JAY: Well, the Internet obviously has changed the way people shop, so we’ve had to really put a lot of time and effort into our website. We’re continually looking for ways to make the site better, get more product on our website that is relevant to people that we have in the store. We do a lot with our Facebook page and social media. 

JEFF: Do you see the change as more of a positive or negative for China Towne?

JAY: Right now, I can’t say if it’s one or the other. We don’t have an online shopping cart so we’re not doing sales online. We get a tremendous amount of inquiries and respond to them. We try to work with the customers to get them in the store, provide a value for what they are getting in the store. If customers come in, they can sit on it, feel it, touch it, and we can show the fabrics. We can help show how it will work in their home and do more of a complete room rather than just buying that sofa on a website. Buying locally, you’ve got us for help and are supporting a business and people that give back to your own community.           

About the author: Jeff Knauss is managing partner & president of a digital marketing firm, DigitalHyve.com, and has always been interested in hearing successful executives’ stories. He lives in Camillus with his wife Heta and son Max. For more, check out his blog at www.CnyCeo.org