Growing Up Promo: Tony Ronci - FARO / Souvenir Avanti

Tony Ronci, General Manager of Canadian-based supplier FARO / Souvenir Avanti, was only five years old when his father moved them and their family business from the United States to Montreal. What began in 1986 as a humble costume jewelry manufacturer eventually evolved into an award-winning supplier in the promotional products and souvenir industries, and is largely recognized and highly respected throughout all of North America.

Although not entirely sure what his parents did at such a young age, Tony has spent his entire life in and out of the walls of FARO, and it has been a family affair since the beginning. He recalls his mom always playing an active part in the business, whether it was looking after the books and handling various accounting responsibilities, or present day, being heavily involved with their HR department while serving as FARO’s Vice President. His grandparents (now living back in the states) also moved to Montreal in the beginning to help his parents keep things flexible, purposely moving into a home in close proximity to the factory so they could pick Tony up before and after work each day. At around age 15, Tony started doing summer jobs in the factory, and while it was always discussed that someday he would maybe get involved with the family business, it was never something that was pushed, and there was NEVER any sense of pressure felt.

“I thought that if I did decide to take a permanent role in the company someday, the more experience I had, the better I would be at that time.” This was Tony’s mindset during his high school summers, so it’s no surprise that he continued to do so during his summer breaks while pursuing an engineering degree at Concordia University. From shipping and packaging, to casting molds and even working with FARO’s marketing department, Tony picked up a ton of handy-man skills he has used along the way, and still uses today. After graduation from Concordia, his father encouraged him not to jump into the family business right away so that he could gain experience using his degree in the field he had been studying for the past four years. Tony landed a great job as an engineer with a local chemical manufacturing company where he worked for two years, all the while living at home with his parents. This kept him still very involved with the ins and outs of the family business, and while he liked his current job, he also had thoughts and aspirations of running his own business and all that came with it. They say timing is everything, and this definitely seems to be the case, as Tony was at this crossroad in 2008 when the souvenir side of the business was rapidly declining. Consultants were being brought in to discuss the overall next steps of the company as a whole, and after a seemingly quick offer from his father to join the family business, Tony put in his two-week notice with his employer and officially jumped on board.

Tony quickly realized he wasn’t “just working” on the souvenir division of FARO. People wanted leadership, and it seemed it was automatically expected of him, because he comes from the family that built the organization. He also went into his new role thinking that he could manage his side of the business and that the promo side would run on it’s own. That didn’t happen. “I don’t back down from a challenge,” Tony said, and his quick realizations instantly motivated him to work even harder and take on any and everything that was needed of him throughout the entire company and more. Within two short years, Tony earned the title of General Manager and the responsibility of overseeing people, processes and procedures. As a result, his parents have been able to step back after 40 years of putting their hearts and souls into the company, and are able to oversee the operations from more of an ownership-only standpoint; enabling them to be able to stay home during the pandemic. Tony’s leadership on the promo side of the business would unknowingly save the souvenir side of the company when the global pandemic hit in March of 2020, and it would absolutely contribute to FARO’s ability to continue to employ all of their key people in a time where far too many have had to initiate massive layoffs.

Today, Tony maintains the same mind-set about his own son that his father had in regard to someday joining the family business. “My son is six years old - we don’t even know who he is yet,” Tony shared. “I’d love to see him grow into the family business, but no pressure.” When asked if there have been challenges to running a multi-million dollar business that was started by his father, Tony simply and graciously responded, “You have to earn peoples’ respect, and there are some people you’re just never going to be able to. You just have to accept that and keep working hard, because you have a job to do. This is an opportunity unlike any other, and you just can’t let those people get you down.”