Sold!

Taking trust to the bank

Gary Tice, 58, and Garrett Richter, 55, launched their own bank in 1989 with 14 paid employees and two unpaid-their wives. By the time they sold in 2004, the company had about 1,400 employees and was traded on the New York Stock Exchange.

The two met when Richter transferred to Naples in 1987 after 18 years with a bank in Pennsylvania. Tice had moved south in 1977, shortly after Florida passed legislation loosening branch-banking restrictions and Citizens National Bank lured him from First National Bank in Mercer County, Pa. Citizens was sold and sold again, and Tice, by then the CEO, left in 1984 to start his own bank before resigning in 1988 after a disagreement with the board.

The following year, Tice and Richter launched First National Bank of Naples, and First National Bank of Cape Coral came along a few years later. In 1997, they joined with Tice's former employer, F.N.B. Corp. in Pennsylvania. It was their watershed year.

Tice took the helm around 2001 and moved the headquarters to Florida. Acquisitions accelerated and the Florida unit grew to 75 offices, the Pennsylvania arm to about 135 offices in that state and Ohio, totaling about 2,300 employees. The corporation also diversified, buying up insurance agencies.

The board decided to spin off the Pennsylvania unit, though, and that created First National Bankshares, a public company traded on the New York Stock Exchange. Within a year of the spin-off in early 2004, Fifth Third Bancorp announced plans to acquire it. It sold for approximately $1.6 billion in stock.

"If I had owned the company, I wouldn't sell anything," says Tice. "But that wasn't my role. My role was to represent the shareholders."

Tice and Richter went into business together on a handshake, and what that represents-honesty and integrity-is at the core of the bank's success, they say.

"The way we've practiced and the way I've practiced in my life, you follow the golden rule: Treat people the way you want to be treated," says Tice. "My dad always taught me, 'Your word is your bond-100 percent of the time.'"

The company code was mutual respect and teamwork among co-workers, and "superior service" to customers. Both banking experience and the right personality were required of prospective employees. Through surveys, Richter and Tice found only those who would go above and beyond in customer service.

Since the sale of First National Bankshares, Tice has stayed on as board chairman, and he has invested in a local eldercare franchise. Richter became a senior vice president for Fifth Third Bank. Now they're joining forces on a new venture: Richter plans to run for the District 76 seat in the state House of Representatives, and Tice has agreed to be his campaign treasurer.

Tips from Richter: Little things make a big difference.

Tips from Tice: Hire the right people, put them in the job they're going to succeed in, then get out of their way. My dad always said, "Do what you do best, but do it better than anyone else." Don't go in undercapitalized, because no matter how successful your product or service is, if you don't have the capital to go forward, somebody with the capital will take your idea away from you.

Growth business

Jeff Gargiulo says his father did the hard part-starting the family business. But Jeff and his brother John diversified and grew it into Gargiulo Inc., an agricultural conglomerate with multinational interests, before selling to agriculture and research giant Monsanto for an undisclosed price.

Today Jeff is president and chief executive officer of the Sunkist Growers cooperative, owned by more than 6,000 mostly California and Arizona citrus growers. He also owns a boutique vineyard and winery. Along the way, he's been chairman of the Produce Marketing Association and is now on Florida's Council of 100, the governor's advisory board, where he's helped negotiate international trade agreements.

The 53-year-old Naples native (it's still home, although he's "on assignment out here in California") started in the mid-'70s as a picking-crew boss for Naples Fruit and Vegetable Company, where his father was part owner. By the early 1980s he was president of the company, whose core business was growing tomatoes in Naples and Ruskin.

"We had five freezes in seven years in the period from 1977 to 1982," he says. That compounded the blow from the oil embargo and skyrocketing petroleum prices. So he, his brother and a couple of managers took their first shot at long-term strategic planning and decided to diversify.

They started growing strawberries and moved into Puerto Rico and strawberry central, California, where their Coastal Berry Co. eventually grew into the second largest berry producer in the country. As they became a year-round producer, additional markets opened.

"Opportunities started coming up because we started positioning ourselves a little bit differently," says Gargiulo. "The marketing opportunities became a little more obvious, and the retail climate was changing."

They eventually consolidated their farming, packing, marketing and other companies. And in a pivotal move, they made a joint venture into hybrid-tomato research and development.

"We were very entrepreneurial," says Gargiulo. "We looked for opportunities, made very fast decisions, had partners, but we were all pretty close; and we just kind of followed the customer."

The brothers, their father and a partner owned Gargiulo Inc. when they sold to Monsanto, which promised "revolutionary" biotechnology for tomato production. "Since we were already into plant breeding, we thought this would be a good opportunity for a consolidation," Gargiulo says.

Both brothers stayed on until 1997, when Monsanto decided to break up the company. Since then, Jeff Gargiulo and his wife have started their vineyard and winery in Napa Valley, Calif.

"I've been an entrepreneur, started a company and sold to a Fortune 100 company. I was president inside that, and today I'm CEO of a co-op," he says. "Being an entrepreneur obviously has its advantages, and you're

motivated every day because it's your money. As companies get bigger, motivation sometimes becomes different."

Tips: Get involved with trade associations and politics. The greater network you can create, the more you learn and the better your opportunities.