New CEO Sets Reddi Brake on Course to Controlled Growth : Strategy: The auto parts firm, says Bill Leider, is in transition from its entrepreneurial phase to a ‘professionally managed approach.’

Bill Leider, the chief executive of Reddi Brake Supply Corp. since June, added the titles of president and chief operating officer Sept. 1, following the resignation of founder Bruce Douglass from those positions.

The change in Reddi Brake’s administrative ranks, said Leider, is representative of a shift in the company’s overall business strategy.

“Reddi Brake is at a stage in our development where we have reached the end of the purely entrepreneurial era,” said Leider. “Our next stage of growth and development calls for more of a professionally managed approach to business building.”

Reddi Brake, founded 16 years ago, operates distribution outlets that sell brake systems, chassis components and other auto undercarriage parts to professional installers. Between 1993 and May, 1995, the Ventura-based company grew from 11 to 99 distribution locations across 30 states. Leider said the speedy expansion created some difficulties.

“The company ran into most of the problems we typically see when entrepreneurial companies attempt to grow very rapidly,” he said. “Various elements and functions of the business were not in sync.”

Douglass agreed with Leider that it is time for Reddi Brake to take a different approach.

“The business needs to make that transition from an entrepreneurial to a professional state,” he said. “It’s very difficult to leave a business that you’ve grown and nurtured and enjoyed as much as I have. There’s a lot of pain involved. But being able to leave amicably makes it easier.”

Douglass said one of the reasons he resigned when he did was to spend more time with his 24-year-old daughter, who has been ill. He said he will keep in touch with company officials and will continue to be a major shareholder.

Leider said one of the problems arising from Reddi Brake’s rapid growth is that its computer system is not as efficient as it must be to keep pace with the growing business. He also said that procedures for training store employees have been inadequate.

The first step to getting all the pieces to work together, said Leider, was to impose a moratorium on opening new Reddi Brake stores, a step taken in March. Next, he said, the company needs to build a strong foundation on which to ultimately expand to 250 stores.

“We are building a much more empowered management team and a market-responsive organizational structure,” he said. In part, that means more executives overseeing smaller segments of the company’s operation.

Leider said that three general managers will be added to oversee operations in the western, central, and eastern regions of the country. Each will have a support staff of regional sales managers and sales and training directors.

In addition, a new chief financial officer and a new vice president for marketing are expected to be hired soon.

“We’ll have more senior executives in place and a less centralized form of management,” said Leider, “and that is necessary to take this company to the next level.”

Reddi Brake reported same-store sales of $6,716,186 for July and August, compared to $5,864,143 for the same period last year, an increase of 14.5%. Those sales involved 46 stores in the Reddi Brake chain. Leider declined to provide income figures.

The company reported sales of $21 million for fiscal 1994, down from $26.1 million in fiscal 1993.