Burroughs & Chapin Announces James Apple as New Company President
By Lauren Poster
Burroughs & Chapin executives convened Friday at Pine Lakes Country Club before a gathering of business and community leaders to announce their selection for a new CEO. James Apple of Charlotte, North Carolina won the honor, and began meeting with the major players at Burroughs & Chapin immediately to familiarize himself with the company and discuss the shape it will take in the coming months.
Apple is an accomplished real estate developer noted for his work with Trammel Crow in Charlotte. In 2000, he and another executive from that company broke away to form their own highly successful endeavor, Trade Street Partners (“creating timeless spaces in vital places,” according to the company Web site).
J. Egerton Burroughs, chairman of the board for Burroughs & Chapin, introduced Apple to an audience that included Myrtle Beach City Councilmen Randal Wallace, Michael Lowder and Wayne Gray; Mayor John Rhodes; S.C. Representative Tracy Edge; and Diane DeVaughn Stokes, chair of the City of Myrtle Beach Cultural Arts Advisory Committee.
A main point of interest for community leaders is the direction the company, which has maintained a leading presence on the Grand Strand for well over a century, will take in the wake of the ongoing recession. After more than 20 years with Doug Wendel as CEO, Burroughs & Chapin held a successor for just two short years. Jim Rosenberg tendered his resignation last year, citing a desire to devote more time to charity work. In the interim, longtime company executive Bill Pritchard acted as president. Like Rosenberg, Apple comes to Burroughs & Chapin from outside the Myrtle Beach community and has a distinguished career behind him.
In opening the press conference, Burroughs noted that in the company’s search for a CEO they wanted to find someone who was community-oriented and hands-on, but who also had the professionalism they required. “We wanted someone who understood operations as well as the view from the executive suite,” Burroughs said. “We found all that in one candidate … we have our man. We have our leader.”
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Burroughs also underscored the fact that Apple is a southerner, and not just by proxy. The Huntsville, Alabama native earned his undergraduate and post-graduate degrees from the University of Alabama, and has lived in Charlotte for more than 20 years. “He knows all about fried green tomatoes,” the chairman quipped, as if to emphasize his earlier assertion that “Burroughs & Chapin and our community are intertwined.”
When asked why the company chose to hire someone from outside the local community, Burroughs noted simply that “at this particular time, with the economic times we’re in, it meant that a lot of very talented people were available. We looked at hundreds of people, to be honest, but in the end we went for the most qualified person.”
In his opening statements, Apple noted his excitement at being involved with a company of Burroughs & Chapin’s caliber. “When I learned about Burroughs & Chapin and all it’s done for the community of Myrtle Beach over more than 100 years, I knew I just had to be a part of it,” said Apple. He noted the key accomplishments of the company’s centuries-spanning existence, impressed at their “dream that someday Myrtle Beach would grow to rival northern resorts like Coney Island and Atlantic City.”
A statement like this, of course, raises the question of what Burroughs & Chapin’s goals are for the future. With the sites of the former Myrtle Square Mall and Pavilion Amusement Park now gaping holes in the town’s landscape, it remains to be seen whether Burroughs & Chapin will make replacing these amusements a priority, or whether it will focus on development in neighboring states as it has increasingly done in recent years.
But the company’s chairman cautioned the media to be easy on Apple on his first day. “Ask us that question again in 30 days,” he said. “Let him get settled.”
For his part, Apple seemed elated to be joining the tradition. Moving his wife Denise and their three young children to the area was not a difficult choice for Apple, who noted that “they’re all under five years old – I’m younger than I look!”
Apple believes this will be a fine area in which to raise a family. “I think it’s a comfort to be a part of a company so deeply rooted in the community,” he said. “It’s a legacy that’s extraordinary; I’m looking forward to being a part of the next 100 years.”
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