COS head Skip Ireland poses for a portrait in the office supply company’s showroom Tuesday, June 7, 2016, in Chattanooga, Tenn.Company at a glance
› Founded: 1941 by Henry Ireland› Owners: Skip and Jim Ireland, who purchased the business from their father in 1983› Staff: 48 employees, including 21 with more than 10 years experience› Production expansions: Office furniture in 1965, interiors groups in 1983, managed print services in 2008, facility maintenance supplies in 2013 and safety supplies in 2015Locations through the years› 720 1/2 Cherry Street from 1941 to 1967› 2622 Broad Street from 1967 to 1973› 903 Creekside Road from 1973 to 2002› 1548 Riverside Drive from 2002 to present
Skip Ireland and his younger brother, Jim, took over the family-owned office supply business in 1983 when their father, who had acquired the business from his father 17 years earlier, died after battling cancer at age 55.
“We had to make a decision whether to just sell the business or to try to make a go of it,” Skip Ireland recalls. “I was only 27 and Jim was 23, so like I like to tell people, we were young and stupid and really didn’t know any better.”
But over the past 33 years, Skip and Jim have built Chattanooga Office Supply (COS) into a larger, more diversified and technologically savvy business, now known as COS Business Products and Supply. Among the nine local office supply firms that were in the market in the early 1980s when Skip and Jim took over the business, COS is the only one to have survived against the twin challenges of big box retailers such as Staples, Office Depot and Office Max and the online competition from many of their factory suppliers.
According to the Family Firm Institute, only about 30 percent of family businesses survive into the second generation, and only about one in eight are still viable into the third generation.