An advanced degree from the
H
School of Life
His casual sweater, spectacles and accommodating yet confident manner have graduate student written all over him. In fact, Jon Green is a high school graduate who now counts his former High School, McNair Senior Secondary in Richmond, BC, as one of many customers in his fast growing furniture supply business, Jonathan Morgan & Company (JM&C). He agrees it’s somewhat ironic that most of his clients are schools. “I guess I was kind of typical, not very motivated at school — I sometimes wish I could go back and do it over,” he says. He enjoyed Shop, especially woodworking, but admits he wasn’t academically inclined. His favourite subject was Art. He also liked playing Chess, and there is a Chess set in his office. “This is where I calculate my next business moves,” he jokes. The truth is, he has no time for either Art or Chess. Now 31, married and with two young sons, he’s an extremely busy man leading his company to compete successfully against much larger suppliers. He was a mere lad of 16 when he began working for his grandfather, who owned an Industrial Supply company. By the time Green was in his early twenties, he was supervising 15 employees. At age 27, he was ready for something new. He entered the extremely competitive furniture supply business because several of his relatives in other parts of the globe were already doing well in it. They encouraged him to make his move. “I’ve only been doing this for four years, but I actually have thirty years of family business experience behind me,” he says. Keeping things in the family works well, he says; his secretary, Megan Burrowes, is a distant relative, so when he needs advice, he knows where to find it. Even so, he faced serious obstacles from the beginning. Perhaps the most daunting was that due to provincial budget cutting, the educational market wasn’t exactly awash in cash. His competitors were telling him bluntly that it was a bad time to get into this sector. Green saw it differently. His experience with the industrial supply business had taught him something about working with customers in tough times with tight budgets. “I first got involved with management during the depressed “eighties”, when everybody was having cash flow problems. What we did was work with our clients, and focus on what we could do to help them out, really be of service and offer better value.” He says that cutbacks are an opportunity to focus on serv-
By Monika Ullmann
Green stays on the phone until a deal is reached.
Green and Megan Burrowes, his secretary.
Jon Green in his office, getting ready to meet a client.
School Plant Officials Association of B.C. Spring 2005 19
