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THE IRON WOMAN

Julie Miller remembers when few females were in real estate

By Debra Hazel

It was not easy to be a woman in real estate back when Julie Miller started out. Often she was the only woman at the deal table, and she remembers one man who almost refused to talk to her.

But Miller was not about to let any of this daunt her. She is, after all, the daughter of Viola Madorno, the first female licensed real estate broker in the state of Connecticut, a woman who had been involved in the selling of farms and other properties since the 1920s — even before licensing was established.

“I always felt my mother was the real pioneer,” said Miller, recalling how much she learned watching her mother sell Connecticut farms back in the 1940s. “I remember sitting in a black Model A,” she said. “I’d watch her walking in and talking with these people. Back then, you had to go out and walk the property lines [to determine sizes], and as I grew up, I’d walk them.”

Miller retired last month from her most recent position, that of regional director of real estate at CVS.

Now she has more time to look back and see how much has changed during a career that, by her estimation, has seen her open more than 500 drugstores and supermarkets. For one thing, in those days she would conduct site inspections wearing skirted business suits and heels. “I can remember bloody toes,” she said.

Today the attire could be pants and flats, and the number of women in the industry and in senior management has increased dramatically. But credit for some of the changes should go to Miller herself, some say.

“Julie Miller is the iron woman of retail site selection,” said Gary M. Ralston, president of Winter Park, Fla.-based Florida Retail Development, who as head of Commercial Net Lease Realty frequently sat at the other side of the negotiating table. “Day in and day out, for decades, she has searched out some of the best locations in the country. Julie has touched innumerable stores and helped shape the company that she has dedicated her outstanding work toward.”

Beginnings of a love
Miller’s first deal, so to speak, came at age 15, when she met a couple waiting for her mother to get off the phone. The young Julianne, as she was known then, got in the couple’s car, showed them the property herself, and mom got the deal.

To be sure, the girl got a scolding for running off, but that did not dampen her enthusiasm. She worked for her mother while taking courses in real estate, property management and business at the University of Connecticut; she got her first real estate license in 1959.

Miller married in 1965 and then moved to Miami, where she practiced property management and leasing, becoming a certified property manager in 1969. She was one of only 12 female members of the Institute of Real Estate Management, a Chicago-based commercial-residential trade association.

In 1970 Miller opened her own office, providing leasing, sales and consultation services. And by this time her mother was assisting her, having moved to Florida to be near her daughter. (Madorno died in 1979; her rolltop desk is still in Miller’s home office.)

Being a young woman in those early days in the industry was especially challenging, she says, but throughout her career she clung to some advice her mother gave her.

“She sat me down at the kitchen table, tapping her fingers,” Miller recalls. “She told me, ‘Young lady, in this industry, it’s not that you’re a female. It’s the deal. That’s what you focus on.’”

Miller got her introduction to retail — and corporate — real estate in 1979, when Chicago-based Jewel Food Co. put her in charge of a five-state territory in the Southeast. Few women were involved in the leasing and brokerage side of retail real estate. More than once, she was the only woman in a room, and she often found herself brushed off by men expecting to talk to her male boss. And, of course, there was that man in Georgia who wanted nothing to do with her.

“I was a female, I was young-looking and I was from a company from up north,” she said. “He almost thought of me as a carpetbagger. But I make sure I am prepared. I went in there, convinced him to do the deal and got his respect.”

In 1984 Jewel was acquired by American Stores Co. (itself acquired by Albertsons in 2000). Miller moved over to Family Dollar, finding locations in Florida. She joined Revco in 1985 as regional director of real estate, covering a territory stretching from Savannah, Ga., to Baton Rouge, La., as well as all of Florida.

Following a return to Family Dollar in 1987, Miller rejoined Revco yet again in 1989, moving to its Ohio headquarters.

“What I like to see is passion, and Julie had that — a passion for real estate, for the right sites,” said Marvin Solganik, the now-retired senior vice president and board member of Revco who hired Miller — twice.

CVS acquired Revco in 1997 and relocated Miller back to Florida.

Miller remembers hand-drawing census tracts on maps, information that is available at the click of a mouse today. Communications are instantaneous now, and the pace of the business has picked up dramatically.

But one thing remains constant. “You still can’t replace the person,” she said. “I still believe in dealing with people.”

So what was she like to deal with? “She’s very upbeat,” Solganik said. “But she can be tough and strong when negotiating.”

Sights, not sites
Tough as Miller might be, and much as she loved the business, some things began to bother her in her career. Take the time she started checking her Blackberry for messages while stopped at a traffic light, for instance. Then there is the family photo that shows her with a cell phone and files at a pool at Disney World. She decided it was time to slow down.

“I’ve been going 110 miles an hour,” she said. “I just want to go 70.”

Now divorced, Miller plans to spend more time with daughter Bonnie, son Peter, six grandchildren and her friends. Writing a book is also a possibility. And she wants to hit the road, only this time to see the sights, rather than the sites.

“I love traveling,” Miller said. Maybe that’s just as well, given the amount of it she has had to do. “I want to go back to the places I visited while working and really see them, like Gettysburg, Pennsylvania.” A month in Australia beckons too.

For all that, though, she has not ruled out a return to a business she admits is “in my blood.”