Still trying to maximize the use of a small store, I looked for other categories that met the Four Tests: high value per cubic inch, high rate of consumption; easily handled; and something in which we could be outstanding in terms of price or assortment.

I believe in ruthlessly dumping the dogs at whatever cost. Why? Because their real cost is in management energy. You always spend more time trying to make the dogs acceptable than in raising the okay stores into winners. And it’s in the dogs that you always have the most personnel problems.

My point is that a businessperson who complains about problems doesn’t understand where his bread is coming from. So by hairballs I don’t mean those fundamental issues such as demand, supply, competition, labor, capital, etc., which create the matrix of a business. By hairballs, I mean those wholly unnecessary thorns that come unexpectedly. Their g

We instituted full health and dental insurance back in the 1960s when it was cheap. When I left, we were paying about $6,000 per employee per year! Why? If the employees are stressed by medical bills, they may steal. That’s one good reason for Trader Joe’s generous health and dental plans. On the other hand, we were cheap, cheap, cheap on life insu

It didn’t help that Sol Price had sold FedMart the previous year to another German capitalist, a sale that ended in an explosive exit by Sol, and the subsequent collapse of FedMart.

The bonus was based on Trader Joe’s overall profit, allocated among the stores based on each store’s contribution. Sure, we massaged the numbers to avoid perceived unfairness, but that was basically the system. In 1988, several Captains made bonuses of more than 70 percent of their base pay. And our 15.4 percent retirement accrual applied to bonuse

We set up a program under which each employee (including some part-timers) was interviewed, not by the immediate superior, the store manager, but by the manager’s superior. The principal purpose of this program was to vent grievances and address them where possible. And I think this program was as important as pay in keeping employees with us.

Lighting, I think, is one of the key elements in successful retailing.

the Byzantine management atmosphere at first Rexall and then Hughes Aircraft had convinced me that the only real security lies in having your own business, and this left-hander was well ahead of the curve on that one. Also, I was convinced that I was on a holy mission in preserving a company owned significantly by its employees. My