50 years of furniture: Chairman builds RC Willey from one store to household name

In 1932, both William H. Child and the business that would dominate his adult life were born.

But there were no silver spoons around the Syracuse-area farm where Child was raised.

"Like most farmers, we didn't have a lot of money," Child said. "(Child's father, Fay) worried about debt, but he was very honest. He had a good reputation and a good name."

Child has tried to keep up that good family name. And now, 50 years after Child was handed the keys to the first RC Willey store, billionaire investment guru Warren Buffett says of him, "I wish I could clone him."

How does a farmboy grow up to attract the attention and admiration of one of the richest men in the world? For that matter, how does a man who earned an education degree from the University of Utah end up running a retail empire?

Child will tell you he has been blessed. That he has worked hard, but he also has been fortunate to make the right business moves at the right times.

Those who know Child say it isn't just good fortune that has determined his success at building RC Willey into a household name. Rather, they say, he has used those same qualities of honesty and integrity he learned from his father and mother, Viola — as well as a natural ability to know what consumers want and how they want to get it.

"I think anybody that's as successful as he is has to have a sense, or feel, for what he's doing, and . . . I'm not sure you can learn that," said Arnie Ferrin, former U. athletic director and a longtime friend and golfing buddy of Child. "I think it's an innate sense of what the public wants to buy and how it's priced. . . . I think Bill got into the business and ended up with that innate sense of when to expand and how to buy. It's just remarkable."

All the more so considering how Child got into the retailing business.

Humble beginnings

Child married Darlene Willey, the daughter of Rufus Call Willey, in 1951 and worked sometimes at Willey's Syracuse appliance store.

On the day Child graduated from college in 1954, Willey turned the store over to him. He was sick and said he would be back in two weeks. A few months later, Willey died of cancer, leaving Child in charge of a store that he didn't really know how to run.