FBI taps Foy as president
By Gary Evans -- Furniture Today, February 15, 2004
TUPELO, Miss. — Tom Foy, president and CEO of Lane Home Furnishings since 1996, has been named president and chief operating officer of parent company Furniture Brands International.
He assumes the president's post held by Mickey Holliman, who will continue as chairman and CEO.
Randy Spak, executive vice president of sales and marketing at Lane, has been promoted to replace Foy as Lane president. Spak joined Action Lane in 1986 as Southern sales manager, became vice president of strategic and corporate accounts in 1997 and was named executive vice president of sales and marketing in April 2000.
Foy, 56, began his career with Rike's Department Store, a division of Federated Department Stores, and has held posts at Simmons USA and Selig Mfg., where he was senior vice president and general manager of upholstered products. He joined Action Inds. in 1985 as vice president of sales, was promoted in 1989 to senior vice president of sales, and in 1995 became executive vice president of sales and marketing.
Holliman called Foy's appointment "part of an orderly process of succession at the senior level of this company. In this newly created role, Tom will oversee all our operating companies in implementing the many strategic initiatives we are currently pursuing.
"I have worked closely with Tom while we were both at Lane and since I have undertaken my current role at Furniture Brands, and I know him to be a man of great vision and ability who will work tirelessly to help drive this company forward," he said.
Holliman, 67, has an employment agreement with the company to remain actively engaged through at least the end of 2005 and has not publicly expressed a desire to retire.
Foy has been nominated to serve on the board of FBI — which owns Broyhill, Lane, Thomasville, Henredon, Drexel Heritage and Maitland-Smith — and his nomination will be submitted to FBI stockholders in the company's upcoming proxy statement.
Also nominated as a new director will be BancorpSouth Chairman and CEO Aubrey Patterson.
Foy said his immediate goals as FBI president will be learn the complexities of working with Wall Street as a public company and to be involved in how FBI's individual companies run and maintain their businesses.
"We've got a bit of wind at our backs right now and we've got to keep that wind going," he said.
Foy added that FBI has an "aggressive" schedule to open more single-brand stores for its manufacturer nameplates — currently at 190 units with a plan to grow to 425 in three-and-a-half years.
"I look forward to this opportunity to work side-by-side again with Mickey Holliman," said Foy. He said their history goes back to when Holliman sold Action products to Foy as a retailer and later hired him for a position at Action.
"Mickey is truly an icon in our industry, and he has set Furniture Brands on a path to becoming the dominant player in the furniture business," Foy said. "I am honored to be called upon to fill this position of great responsibility and to join him as part of the Furniture Brands senior management team."
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