McCoy's Celebrates Four Decades of Service

On July 12, McCoy’s Building Supply’s risk and safety coordinator, Jon Wallace, celebrated 40 years with the company. McCoy’s headquarters employees gathered in the building’s common area to share cake and memories of four decades of service.

“It’s really unique to have known someone all your life and to still be working with them this long,”  reminisced McCoy’s Board of Director Chuck Churchwell. “Jon and I grew up together in Luling, and after my father passed away when I was ten, Jon’s dad, H.B., would invite me to play with him in the annual father/son golf tournament. We both went to school at SWT and when I joined the McCoy’s team in 1970, I recommended that Jon interview the next time we had an opening.”

“He ended up really having to pay his dues,” Churchwell said. “He was the manager at our Galveston store when our five-person headquarters was a portable building sitting in the parking lot just steps away from his store. And at that time we also had a rail spur at the store where Jon would have to coordinate material transfers to our Austin and Lubbock locations. Not all the supplies were hearty enough to really be shipped by box car. It was a bit like trying to send sheets of glass through the mail. Back then our parking lot was that loose oyster shell, and Jon would have to stop what he was doing and dig out the forklift which would get stuck in the gravel at least twice a day.”

Long-term service with McCoy’s is worn as a badge of honor. Employees who rank in the 500 most-tenured positions in the company receive a sticker with their tenure rank to wear proudly on their name tags.

A wall in the common area of the company’s headquarters in San Marcos, Texas displays the top 500 employees names. Churchwell ranks number one and Wallace ranks number two, one slot above company CEO, owner and President, Brian McCoy.

“It keeps me humble when I see Jon Wallace and Chuck Churchwell who have longer tenure than I do,” McCoy said. “Honestly, it makes me very proud that so many team members have dedicated themselves to the long-term success of McCoy’s Building Supply. We’re a family business, and our employees are like family.”

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, average employment tenure in the U.S. is 4.4 years, with retail jobs like McCoy’s typically having a shorter tenure, at 3.3 years. The building materials retailer breaks the mold for both categories with longer than typical tenure from its employees. The average employee tenure for all McCoy’s locations is 6.9 years.