Paige Horn, Operations Manager for Dixie Paper Company Inc., didn’t begin her career wanting to be a part of the family business. “I graduated from Baylor 2007 with a major in marketing and minor in interior design. My goal at the time was to go into the publishing industry, and I especially liked the idea of working for a regional magazine,” she said. She moved to Baton Rouge and started working for 225 Magazine and the Baton Rouge Business Report. “While I was working for the 225/BRBR in Baton Rouge and then the Baton Rouge Symphony Orchestra, I also did freelance projects for Dixie - developing their website etc. I then moved to Dallas to do sales for Dixie for about a year, and then asked to be pulled into the operations side. I started out as marketing director, and as I got more entrenched into the company I became Operations Manager,” she said.
Dixie Paper is a total facility supply company that her grandparents, Huey and Marjorie Horn started from scratch. “My grandparents started the company in 1976. My grandfather worked for a company called Freeman Paper Company in Shreveport, he started Dixie and told my dad and his brother that they could be a part of the company, but that they wouldn’t get any free passes or by being family,” she said. “So it was the four of them - my grandfather took his accounts with him from Freeman and started the company that way, my grandmother took care of the bookkeeping, my uncle drove the delivery truck and my dad ran the warehouse. Eventually my grandfather hired another person to do deliveries, and someone to run the warehouse and sent my dad and uncle out to do sales, and that’s how the company started to grow,” she said. “Their only office furniture in the beginning was my grandparents’ old patio furniture.” In 1985 they established the location in Tyler. “They started off in a little machine shop and we now have a 60,000 square foot warehouse now.”
Dixie Paper Company Inc. distributes janitorial, sanitary maintenance and paper products, office supplies and industrial chemicals to businesses. “We can supply anything from a tiny box of paper clips up to a 55 gallon drum of chemical. We deliver any order for free on our trucks regardless of size,” she said.
The fact that her grandparents started Dixie Paper from small beginnings offers a strong sense of pride and enjoyment for Horn in her work. “I love being a part of operations and being on the ground level. If I see something wrong, I love that I have the flexibility to fix it immediately. I like that aspect of my position,” she said. “I have a huge amount of pride in the company and respect for what my grandparents built from around 100 customers.”
When you work with your family in a family-run business, it is easy to come across meaningful mentors, and Horn has been blessed with a family that has set a strong example. “My dad has helped me as far as learning about the business in and out. And as far as management style, remembering how my grandmother dealt with people when she was still alive stays with me every day. We were very close and I would go and spend days at the office and watch her work - the memory of her and how gracious she was shapes my management style,” she said.
When she isn’t going back and forth between Dixie Paper’s Shreveport and Tyler locations, Horn finds comfort in relaxing during her off time. “I enjoy playing tennis and cooking. Cooking in the evenings after a long day is really calming. I also have a spry 3 year- old Welsh Terrier who goes to the office with me every day and is our company mascot. “ Horn is proud of the company her grandparents built, and how the original feel of the company stays with them today. “The family aspect keeps our mentality small, but we are able to service and compete against larger companies. We have someone working for us who is 87 years old and started working with us when my grandfather started the company in ‘76, and the three original employees in our Tyler location are still with us. We have people working for us that range in age from 22 to 87 which is just incredible.”
