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BEER BARON: Stewart Has Headed Up Anheuser-Busch Distributorship for More Than 20 Years

Posted on: Monday, 26 December 2005, 09:00 CST

By Linda S. Morris, The Macon Telegraph, Ga., The Macon Telegraph, Ga.

Dec. 26--Winburn "Brother" Stewart Jr. grew up in the beer business.

He started working for his father at Bibb Distributing Co. in Macon at the ground floor when he was 14 years old.

"I was unloading boxcars and sometimes working on the trucks," said Stewart, 55.

Now president and chief executive officer, Stewart began working full time for the company as soon as he graduated from the University of Georgia in 1974.

Bibb Distributing is the Middle Georgia distributor to 15 counties for all Anheuser-Busch products, including the top-selling Budweiser brand. The company supplies beer to every retailer in the region that sells its product.

Though Stewart often keeps a low-profile about his philanthropy, friends and business associates say Stewart is generous and caring about others who are less fortunate.

"He's been a humble, quiet investor," said Jim Stiff, president/CEO of Goodwill Industries of Middle Georgia. Stewart serves on Goodwill's board.

"He really likes to get things done behind the scenes," Stiff said. "He's intensely creative, and he's a no-nonsense guy with a great sense of humor."

Irby Small, executive director of the Central Georgia Council, Boy Scouts of America, has known Stewart about 12 years as a fellow Rotarian and through United Way. Small said Stewart does things for the community without trying to take credit.

"He won't dislocate his shoulder trying to pat himself on the back," Small said. "He strikes me as a thinker. He's always even-keeled. He's steady, dependable."

Stewart said he tries to show compassion for other people.

"When I look at someone who has less than me, I feel that but by the grace of God, there goes me," he said. "I feel it and I believe it, and that's why I try to support those who have less opportunities than I have."

In the mid-1990s, Stewart became a principal member of the Macon Sports Group that owned the Macon Whoopee minor league hockey team. The team dissolved in 2002.

"I wanted to keep it here ... but we were losing $300,000 a year," he said.

Stewart has served on boards or committees of a number of groups, including the Macon Boys Club, the American Heart Association, American Cancer Society, United Way, the Macon-Bibb County Chamber of Commerce and the Museum of Aviation at Robins Air Force Base.

WORKING WITH FATHER SEEMED TO BE GOOD FIT

Stewart was born in Macon and attended Joseph Clisby Elementary School for four years. Before he was 10, his parents divorced.

At first he lived with his father, but shortly afterward moved back and forth between parents. His mother remarried a Baptist preacher and moved to North Carolina and then to the heart of coal country in Harlan, Ky. He changed schools six times before graduating from Harlan High School in 1968.

When a friend from Macon visited him in Kentucky and heard his siblings call him "Brother," that's when people in Middle Georgia began calling him that, too, he said.

During his summers in Macon, Stewart began working at Bibb Distributing, which his father founded in 1956.

"This business was real small when I was growing up," he said. "To work with my father seemed a perfect fit to me. It was challenging. It was very hard work."

When he entered his freshman year at the University of Georgia, he started "the best six years of my life," he said, laughing at the memory.

"I had a lot of catching up to do," he said. "I had a lot of pent-up demand for enjoying life. My first year was not a pretty sight."

When he began work at Bibb Distributing full time after graduating in 1974, the company had 25 employees.

"We made a grand total of $40,000 that year," he said. "I was paid $4,800 the first year -- before taxes."

His first responsibility was to be in charge of a new experiment his father had started: selling Chilly Willy machines which made icy drinks. Stewart was responsible for delivering the machines, selling syrup and cups and keeping the machines operating. But the venture was never profitable, and it was sold after about nine months.

In 1974, after years of throwing cases of beer around as a kid, Stewart had to have major surgery on his back. He was in bed for three months.

"It's probably the best thing that happened to me," he said. "I said, 'If I am not paralyzed, I was never going to waste my life.' "

While recovering from surgery, Stewart began handling administrative duties for the company: ordering products, handling sales and marketing content. Stewart, who has worked in nearly every position at the company, was named president in 1984.

State Rep. Allen Freeman, R-Macon, said he has known Stewart more than 15 years.

"He's very professional and always thinking about work and how to improve his company," Freeman said. "He puts a good face on his product ... and is very business-oriented in every move he makes."

PROMOTING RESPONSIBLE DRINKING

Stewart bought the business from his father in 1988. It now has 84 employees and had about $44 million in sales last year, he said.

Whenever he travels around Middle Georgia and stops for lunch or dinner, he samples the company's product.

"I will order a draft beer to make sure it has a good taste," he said. "If it's not fresh, I will shut (the tap) down until we can replace it."

He acknowledges that one of the toughest challenges he faces is selling and promoting a product some people abuse.

"One of the things I was blessed in seeing when I was rolling beer in the summers was how alcohol consumption -- especially excessive alcohol consumption -- could ravage a human spirit," he said. "To that end, I have spent considerable time and effort and money trying to stem the evils of excessive alcohol consumption, personally."

He talks to groups at Mercer University and other schools about responsible drinking by adults and has worked on local and state DUI task forces.

Stewart recently hosted a Christmas party for all the company's workers, giving him the chance to enjoy his favorite part of his job.

"I got a chance to thank our employees and tell them how much I appreciate them," he said. He handed out bonuses to everyone.

"I wouldn't be here if I didn't have some really, really great people around me," he said.

His wife, Deidra Stewart, whom he married seven years ago, is in charge of accounts payable at the company.

His children from his first marriage don't work in the business by design.

"I've seen too many situations where children come straight out of college and work in the family business," he said. "They come in with expectations and feelings of entitlement. I would love for them to join me down the road, after they have experienced life under other bosses and under other circumstances. Not to say, they want to come here. They may not, but they are stockholders."

In the next five to 10 years, Stewart said he can see Bibb Distributing offering more than Anheuser-Busch products.

"And, I see us expanding into different lines, such as wines and possibly liquor, possibly non-alcoholic beverages," he said. "We're looking at distribution changes and ways to improve delivery performance in ways that help employees."

But retirement is not something on his radar screen.

"I think I had the original (attention deficit disorder) because my brain never stops," he said. "When I wake up at 2 or 3 o'clock in the morning, I'm solving problems. It never shuts down. I don't know that I could ever retire."

To contact Linda S. Morris, call 744-4223 or e-mail lmorris@macontel.com [mailto:lmorris@macontel.com].

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Copyright (c) 2005, The Macon Telegraph, Ga.

Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News.

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Source: The Macon Telegraph (Macon, Ga.)

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