Dad & Company
The perks of working with your father can be plentiful, say those who do it … and love it
As a kid, Suki Lee always yearned to spend time with her dad Jong Sik, but he was consumed with running the Korean bakery he opened after immigrating to Canada.
His long hours at Koreatown’s Hodo Kwaja forced Suki to get inventive and offer to fold dessert boxes just to be together.
“My father said, ‘How about I give you one penny for every box you fold?’ ” she recalled in an interview ahead of Father’s Day.
“Obviously, when you’re little, you can’t fold that fast, so it became daddy-daughter bonding time.”
Decades later, Suki, 31, is still folding boxes — albeit more quickly. This time she earns more than a penny each because she’s taken on a more active role at the 26-year-old family business.
Suki, her mother and her 63-year-old father make up to 5,000 hodo kwaja — the bakery’s namesake cake that looks like a walnut and is filled with sweet red beans or mashed potatoes — every weekend. The arrangement puts them among the many family businesses operating in the country and places Suki in a club with Loblaws scion Galen Weston Jr., dairy titan Lino Saputo Jr. and Canada Goose executive Dani Reiss: They all worked alongside their fathers. The perks of working with Dad can be plentiful. There’s an opportunity to grow closer to a loved one, often the boss can be more understanding about family commitments — and sometimes such partnerships make more money.
A 2018 Credit Suisse study found family-owned companies have financially outperformed nonfamily-owned businesses since 2006.
However, such an arrangement also can be fraught with tension, especially when office drama spills over to the dinner table.
Those wanting proof need look no further than auto parts magnate Frank Stronach and his daughter Belinda’s $520-million feud over mismanaged assets.
Suki has had occasional spats with her dad and often jokes about the time her father fired — and rehired — her then-kid-brother, but the family gets along well.
Jong Sik says having Suki around gives him the peace of mind that the business will be OK when he heads home for the day. He navigates the personal-professional relationship by reminding himself that “Work is work. Home is home.”
“If we argue about home, we do not let it interrupt our work,” he said in an email.
“My daughter is stubborn and I am usually the one who has to give in when we argue about
home, but when it comes to work we equally have to discuss it to work it out.”
The partnership works because Suki’s mother and father tackle the baking and backhouse tasks, while she handles customers and social media.
“There have been times when the job is stressful and I wanted to walk off the job, but I promised my dad I would work for him as long as he needs me. Five years from now or 10, however long,” Suki said.
She noted she put her studies on hold to help out at the bakery when an employee left, but then fell in love with the gig and never went back.
“My father will tell people he wouldn’t be able to keep this business until now without me and I tell people I wouldn’t be where I am right now without him.”
Over at Kettleby-based family business Guaranteed Roofing, Rob Capobianco is just as close with his 30-year-old son Nic.
Rob began teaching Nic the trade when he was 12.
Nic worked for him every summer until he joined the 25-year-old business full-time.
Nic and Rob manage the personal-professional dynamic by operating around one policy: Respect.
Aside from the typical disagreements most parents have with their kids in their teenage years, they’ve always gotten along well. “My dad was the one that taught me to just sit there and listen instead of yelling at him sometimes, so I did,” Rob recalled, laughing.
“It was a trying time … but (Nic) always did a hard day’s work and never complained.”
Nic still helps with the business, but has also started working with his cousin Richard at Roofr, a website they run that uses satellite imagery to give roofing estimates and connect people with roofers.
Rob, who Nic now considers his best friend, is always on call for advice. “Sometimes I am at a customer’s house and they had the roof done by another company five years ago.
“It is leaking now, but everything looks fine. I’ll call my dad and he’ll tell me where to look. He doesn’t even have to look at the roof,” Nic said.
“I am helping people in Cincinnati. Roofr doesn’t cover that area … so it has no monetary value for us, but my dad taught us to take five minutes and help people.”
Lisa Campbell, 35, has also gotten used to leaning on her 65-year-old dad Steven, especially when it comes to negotiations for their Toronto-based business, Lifford Cannabis Solutions.
Lifford, a subsidiary of the wine and spirits agency Steven runs, helps brands tackle the distribution and legalization of cannabis.
While Lisa loves working with her father, she admits there are challenges.
“It is hard to have work-life balance,” she said, noting that even her younger sister works alongside her and her father on the wine side of the business.
“At family dinners often we are talking about wineries or we go to the cottage and we will have suppliers visit.”
Lisa first worked for Steven, helping with returns, orders and his website, just after she hit the legal drinking age, but later took a break to work in harm reduction and drug policy jobs.
When Prime Minister Justin Trudeau started talking about legalizing recreational cannabis, it got her thinking about business opportunities.
Steven was intrigued, but it took Lisa threatening to move to Colombia to get him to delve into the cannabis industry and name Lisa as Lifford’s chief executive officer.
“I have so many memories of him taking me to the wineries and now I am taking him to all the cannabis farms,” Lisa said, chuckling.