Getting his Irish up.

• Author: Bailey, David
• Position: Unifi Inc.'s Allen Mebane - International Business Report

Faced with EC protectionism, Unifi's Allen Mebane decided the way to beat the Europeans was to join them.

In 1980, just two years after Greensboro-based Unifi Inc. got into exports, the polyester-yarn finisher had cut itself a 6% slice of the European market.

That's when the European Economic Community charged Unifi with dumping. "It took us nine months to exonerate ourselves," Chairman Allen Mebane recalls. "Then they hit us with dumping again, and I said, 'Wait a minute. If they're going to protect these markets so well, why don't I go to Europe and buy a plant and let them protect me?'"

That's just what the take-charge, impatient Mebane did in 1984, buying a struggling plant in County Donegal in the Republic of Ireland. Since then, Unifi has totally modernized its 270,000-square-foot plant in Letterkenney, landing Unifi 15% of Europe's 200,000-ton texturized-polyester market and 20% of European sales.

Still impatient, Mebane, 64, is determined to double Unifi's capacity in Ireland over the next few years to gain a 25% to 30% market share in Europe. "In my opinion, Unifi is the most globally oriented company in the textile industry," says Lorraine Miller, a textile/apparel analyst with Robinson-Humphrey Co. in Atlanta.

Unifi's orientation may be global, but it's storming the European market with the same strategy it used to capture 60% of domestic textured-yarn sales: running a bare-bones front office and installing better technology than competitors. The result? Unifi produces yarn at a price others can't beat. "They are quite literally taking their competitors out of the business in Europe as they did in America," says Peter Hegarty, a former Unifi employee who is president of American Textile Export Co., a Gastonia-based trading company.

"They're aggressive," says Bill Steed, a senior account manager in Greensboro with fiber-maker DuPont, "and they think globally. They mean to be a global presence."

That all may sound progressive and visionary, but Unifi's international stance is grounded in necessity. Year after year, investors have grown so accustomed to the company's world-beater sales and earnings that Unifi must scour the globe to keep pace with itself. With a track record second to none in American textiles and an average five-year price-to-earnings multiple of 15.5 (the average is 10 to 12), investors count on Unifi to deliver. Consequently, they react to the slightest blip in performance. That was evident in recent months when Unifi's stock slipped sharply as business slowed and margins weakened. But based on the past, it won't be down for long.

A couple of years ago, Mebane was asked to address the American Apparel Manufacturers Association on how Unifi, with 6,000 employees (600 of them overseas), planned to succeed in the '90s. "At Unifi, our strategy is simple," he said. "We're going to block and tackle very well."

Even though President William Kretzer, 47, took the title of CEO in 1985, Chairman Mebane is definitely still the head coach. (Kretzer, a former N.C. State basketball player, declined to be interviewed.)

The great-great-grandson of a cotton-mill owner, Mebane grew up in Greensboro. His father, who ran an insurance agency, sent him to Davidson College, but Mebane transferred to the Philadelphia College of Textiles and Science.

In 1950, right out of school, he took a job with Sale Knitting Co. (now Tultex) in Martinsville, Va. He started in manufacturing...