Still going strong at age 87

Who would misspell Fruitticher with three 't's on a delivery truck, just to see if someone would notice? Dave Wood II would.

The 51-year-old co-owner of Wood Fruitticher Grocery is a character, with a quick, dry wit and perhaps the state's largest collection of antique lawn mowers, stowed neatly under a stairwell at company headquarters on Morris Avenue. Visitors to his office can sit on any of the three 1940s-era theater chairs that face his desk.

Dave and his brother John, 49, have expanded the wholesale food distribution business started in 1913 by their grandfather, Dave Wood, and his partner, Oscar Fruitticher, into one of Alabama's largest, most successful institutional food suppliers.

Last year, the company and its 215 employees generated $84 million in revenue, which Dave Wood says has doubled every four years. Wood Fruitticher (pronounced "fruit-a-ker") distributes fresh and frozen vegetables, meats, condiments and other foodstuffs to the health care industry (mostly nursing homes), restaurants, schools and convenience stores in Alabama, Georgia and the Florida Panhandle.

Room to play ball

The company runs two shifts at a warehouse larger than five football fields just off John Rogers Drive near the Birmingham International Raceway. Frozen food is Wood Fruitticher's niche, and produce is imported from as far away as Malaysia. Bananas are the top seller.

Dave is the front man and salesman. John is the operations and numbers guy.

"It was a. year before anyone caught it," Dave Wood says with a laugh about his deliberate misspelling of Fruitticher.

Ten years ago the Wood brothers began putting the company name, with a noticeable Christian fish logo, on its fleet of 60 delivery trucks.

"I'm a wholesaler, and ego was not a big concern. Every mailbox or dog you hit, the rest of the trucks would get blamed for it," Dave Wood says.

The brothers wanted the Christian logo to reflect their philosophy.

"It's a real part of me and John, what we believe in and who we are. What if we have some impact on someone's life," by displaying the symbol?

A customer's opinion

Indeed, the brothers' philosophy has had an impact. Just ask one of their customers.

"There's no substitute for a company who has an owner you can call on the phone and discuss an issue or get a complaint resolved," says Russell Tiner, assistant administrator at Bessemer Carraway Medical Center.

"They're just doing the same thing day after day with their eye on the long term, as opposed to a quick hit," Tiner says.

John's Restaurant co-owner Jodie Stanfield, who is a former salesman for Wood Fruitticher and now-a customer, has firsthand knowledge of the brothers' compassion.

"I'm amazed at those people," Stanfield says. His brother, Scott, who is still a salesman for Wood Fruitticher, had just begun working there when he was injured in a car accident. He was bedridden for three months.

"His boss ended up running his route, and he didn't miss a paycheck the entire three months," Jodie Stanfield says. "I asked Scott, 'They did that for you when you haven't done anything yet for them?' That's what sets them apart from any other company. That's why I went to work for them."

Dave Wood says it's a matter of treating

everyone like family.

'We have no debt'

He says the company's success can be attributed to two key factors.

"Financially, we're extremely conservative. We have no debt," he says.

"Secondly, we. copy people real well. We're pretty quick, when we see something, to embrace it. You won't see me plowing the field, but I'll be right behind him."

An example is the company's decision two years ago to use the Roadnet route management software program developed by UPS. The system is so efficient that the company eliminated the need for six of its delivery trucks.

Wood Fruitticher has an innovative distribution system. Filled delivery trucks from Birmingham are sent to 20 drivers based in Five ,depots: Montgomery, Mobile, Dothan, Atlanta and Macon.

Those drivers make deliveries on their local routes, while empty trucks from the previous day's delivery are returned to Birmingham.

The Wood brothers' grandfather was an innovator himself when he opened the business 87 years ago. He would buy box cars of foodstuffs and sell them to retailers before his bills came due, Dave Wood recalls.

Two nights of robbery

He describes his grandfather's partner, Oscar Fruitticher, as "the glibtongued peddler."

"They got robbed one night, with pistols and everything. Oscar you've never met a nicer guy - tells the robbers, 'This is all I've got right now. But if you come back tomorrow night, I'll give you all I've got.'

"They came back the next night and robbed them again," Wood says.

Over the years, Wood Fruitticher moved to First Avenue North, out to Third Avenue North near Avondale Mills, then finally in 1984 to Morris Avenue.

Grandfather Dave eventually bought Fruitticher out. The elder Wood died in a car accident in 1948, leaving the business to Bill Wood, Dave and John's father.

"Nobody took bets he would hold it together," Dave Wood says of his father. "He would tell you that himself But he did."

After Bill Wood died in 1980, the brothers took over. A member of the fourth generation, Dave III, has joined the business. He recently graduated from the University of Alabama. His father is excited about keeping the company in the family.

"Tomorrow, I'm going to sell to some of my old customers up in Fort Payne. I'm going to take Dave III with me," the proud papa says. "I can't wait."