A Chat With May's Profile, John Doheny, CEO, Doheny's Water Warehouse
Catalog Success: Where's your company headquartered?
John Doheny: Kenosha, Wisconsin.
CS: When was the company established?
JD: My parents started it as a wholesale pool supply business out of their garage in 1967.
CS: When did the company begin mailing catalogs?
JD: Our first catalog mailed in the spring of 1980.
CS: What are your catalog's customer demographics?
JD: In-ground and above-ground pool owners and commercial pool operators.
CS: What's the primary merchandise you sell?
JD: Swimming pool supplies.
CS: How many SKUs do you offer? On average, how many SKUs are offered in the catalog?
JD: Over 4,000 total, with approximately 1,500 in any active catalog.
CS: How many employees work at the company?
JD: Forty-eight full-time, plus an additional 90-110 seasonal hires.
CS: How many times per year do you mail the catalog?
JD: Sixteen.
CS: What's the catalog's annual circulation?
JD: Over 13 million.
CS: What's the company's annual sales?
JD: $40 million to $50 million.
CS: Do you have retail stores?
JD: We have one retail outlet at our headquarters in Kenosha.
CS: How do sales breakdown by channel?
JD: Eighty-five percent of our sales are to residential customers, B-to-C, and the other 15 percent are commercial/wholesale customers, B-to-B.
CS: How did you get started in the catalog/multichannel business?
JD: The company started as a wholesale distributor of pool supplies in the Midwest market. In 1979, my dad came across a list of swimming pool homeowners and the idea of delivering pool supplies directly to homeowners’ doors via a catalog was hatched.
My parents gambled everything they had and mailed out our first catalog in 1980. I purchased the business from my parents 12 years ago. At that time, we did just under $10 million a year in sales.
Joe Keenan is the executive editor of Total Retail. Joe has more than 10 years experience covering the retail industry, and enjoys profiling innovative companies and people in the space.
