Roger Gildehaus: Thriving in retail for 50 years

With an unwavering work ethic that has shaped his life from an early age, Roger Gildehaus, the Bentonville businessman, continues to thrive in his 50th year working in the retail business.

Born into a large family of nine siblings in Union, Mo., Gildehaus learned the value of hard work and self-reliance at a young age. “I’ve been working since the fifth grade,” he shared in a recent interview. “If we wanted something, we had to earn it ourselves.”

With that mindset, Gildehaus, 69, has achieved remarkable success, first as a store manager and executive at Walmart Inc. and now as a prominent national liquor retailer.

His exceptional leadership and commitment to delivering a unique shopping experience have propelled Missouri-based Macadoodles into one of the nation’s most successful beverage enterprises.

Since Macadoodles’ humble beginnings in the border town of Pineville, where the first store opened in 1997, Gildehaus has expanded the business into a chain of two corporate stores and an additional 10 locations, all operating under franchise agreements authorized by him. Together, these 12 stores generated nearly $100 million in revenue last year.

In June, the Beverage Alcohol Retailers Conference (BARC) in St. Louis honored Macadoodles as the 2023 Retailer of the Year. Beverage Dynamics, a leading trade publication, featured Gildehaus on the cover of its June issue, underscoring his status as a prominent figure in the industry.

Macadoodles was previously honored by Market Watch magazine, a publication covering the U.S. beverage alcohol industry. They recognized the company as Retailer of the Year in 2016 and Merchandiser of the Year in 2012.

Reflecting on these accolades, Gildehaus fondly recalls the Merchandiser of the Year award, saying, “That’s the one I’m most proud of. During my years working for Mr. Sam [Walton], he always emphasized the importance of having merchants in our Walmarts, not just shopkeepers. Anyone can be a shopkeeper, but merchants build strong companies.

“On the stage that night, I could almost see Mr. Sam’s smiling face watching over me.”

25 YEARS AT WALMART
Beginning with his first Walmart job in 1973 as an assistant store manager in Festus, Mo., Gildehaus excelled in various roles, earning a reputation for his strategic thinking, business acumen and dedication.

He was 24 when the retailer gave him his first store manager job in Coffeyville, Kan. The company bought an old grocery store and converted it into a Walmart store.

Ferold Arend, Walmart’s first corporate president and chief operating officer, paid a surprise visit to the store shortly after Gildehaus arrived. After the two men completed a store walk-through, Arend gave an ultimatum.

“We were walking back to his car, and he ate me up one side and down the other,” Gildehaus recalled. “[Arend] said the store looked like [expletive] and gave me 30 days to get it fixed or I wouldn’t be the store manager there. I said, ‘Yes sir,’ and got to work.”

Gildehaus and his team re-did the store in a couple of weeks and, true to his word, Arend — who served in the U.S. Navy as a signalman during World War II — returned 30 days later for another inspection.

“As we walked out to his car, he looked at me and said, ‘Young man, I don’t know how you did this, but the transformation is amazing. This looks like a great retail store now. Congratulations.’”

Gildehaus’ standing as a go-getter who knew how to get things done opened up numerous opportunities at Walmart. He climbed the corporate ladder and traveled the world, ultimately becoming the vice president of general merchandising for Walmart International.

In the final few years of that job in the mid-’90s, Gildehaus frequently traveled to more than a dozen countries worldwide. Despite his successful career, he prioritized family over work and devised a “retirement plan” to keep him closer to home.

The retirement plan was to open a liquor store across the border in Missouri — Benton County was a dry county until 2012 — an idea he’d been kicking around for a while.

“I knew I was going to retire before too long and needed something to keep me busy,” he said.

One year after opening Macadoodles in Pineville, Gildehaus was 44 when he bid farewell to Walmart in 1998 to devote his undivided attention to his budding entrepreneurial venture.

FOUNDING PRINCIPLES
Gildehaus founded Macadoodles with a clear vision: to create a destination where customers could explore an extensive selection of spirits, wines and beers while receiving exceptional service.

Drawing from his Walmart days and learning from Sam Walton, Gildehaus emphasized Macadoodles’ three founding principles:

• Carry the best assortment of wine, spirits and beer of any store in the marketplace.
• Fair and competitive prices
• Customer service beyond expectations.

“They are as important today as they were 26 years ago when I wrote them on a piece of paper,” Gildehaus said.

With his retail background and industry insights, Gildehaus meticulously created a business plan to stand out from competing liquor stores at the state line and revolutionize the way customers perceive liquor shopping.

“The competition at the time had bad reputations for high prices, small assortments and no customer service,” Gildehaus recalled. “Macadoodles is the opposite on all three.”

The Pineville store’s 14,000-square-foot layout — the largest in the chain — is inviting, with well-organized aisles and displays that make it easy for customers to navigate and find their preferred products. Macadoodles’ wide-ranging inventory showcases a selection of local, domestic and international brands, catering to diverse tastes and preferences.

At the Pineville store, beer accounts for 35% of sales, followed by spirits (30%), wine (23%) and general merchandise (12%). Macadoodles’ wine selection, housed in a 5,000-square-foot underground wine cellar, has roughly 4,000 labels. The store has around 1,700 spirits SKUs, approximately 1,000 craft beer SKUs and a wide range of domestic beers.

GROWING FOOTPRINT
Gildehaus said franchised stores remain the company’s growth engine and he doesn’t plan on opening more corporate locations. Macadoodles, which has been franchising for 15 years, opened three Missouri stores in 2022. The next store will open in Omaha, Neb., next spring another is planned in West Siloam Springs, Okla., and two more are in the works near the St. Louis market, including his hometown of Union.

“That will be a proud day for me to open a store in my hometown where I grew up,” he said.

Gildehaus, who will turn 70 in November, maintains broad involvement in the establishment of every new franchise location, taking personal charge of store setup and delivering comprehensive training to franchisees before relinquishing control.

“When you sell a franchise, you’re selling yourself,” he said.

Gildehaus said as long as his health isn’t a factor, he doesn’t plan on slowing down.

“My wife jokes that if you ever see an ambulance backed up at the end of Macadoodles, you know Roger just retired,” he joked. “I love retailing and merchandising and dealing with customers.”

GUESS WHO?
Besides the flagship store in Pineville, Macadoodles’ other corporate store is in Bentonville. It’s called Guess Who? Gildehaus’ wife, Sarah, owns that store.

Here’s the backstory, courtesy of Beverage Dynamics.

“Guess Who? is very similar to Macadoodles, but when Gildehaus initially sought a liquor permit in Bentonville [after Benton County voters turned the county wet in 2012], state officials rejected his application due to an Arkansas state law that only allows one permit per licensee. The board claimed the Springdale franchise agreement counted as Gildehaus’ one license.

“As Gildehaus already held the position of president of Gild Holdings, the corporation that owns Macadoodles, he encouraged his wife to apply for the permit instead, which she did, and she is legally the sole owner and operator of Guess Who? [although Gildehaus says he regularly provides her with business advice].”

UNIQUELY DIFFERENT
Guess Who? opened in 2014 and is aptly named as the Gildehaus’ way of gently thumbing their nose at state liquor authorities. But what about the Macadoodles name? Roger Gildehaus said he wanted a name that would separate his store from other businesses in the area at the time. He enlisted the help of Bob McMurry, a graphic artist and Walmart colleague.

“There were seven liquor stores at the state line in Missouri,” Gildehaus recalled. “The first one was State Line Liquor … real creative. There was a Party Shop and a Hilltop Liquor. I said, ‘Bob, I don’t want that goofy stuff. I want something uniquely different.”

McCurry’s initial idea was Mac Doodles. It was close but wasn’t quite hitting the mark.

While looking at the phrase on McCurry’s computer screen, Gildehaus told him, “After that ‘c,’ pop an ‘a’ in there.”

And with that, Macadoodles hit the mark.

“I kept saying it over and over, and that was it. That’s what we decided to call the business,” Gildehaus said.

McCurry, incidentally, was a co-founder of the first Macadoodles in Pineville as a limited partner. He still owns part of the business but isn’t actively involved in operations.