10 things we bet you didn’t know about Martin Ploy

Sure, AICO’s retiring president is accomplished in the furniture industry, but did you know:

1. Martin Ploy drove Route 66 four times before he got married.
2. Martin and his wife, Mary Ann, have been married 56 years, went to high school together, but did not date until after high school.
3. Martin was a bouncer at a nightclub in Pomona, California — for three days. He got bounced from the job when they found out he was not yet 21 years old. When the owner asked for his ID, Martin went out to his car (which didn’t exist) to get his driver’s license and never went back. It’s a shame, he says, because he could really use the three days of uncollected pay now that he’s retiring.
4. He still misses his best friend, Dick Barrett — fellow industry veteran and City of Hope supporter — who passed away eight years ago.
5. Martin’s favorite author is John Grisham. After reading Grisham’s first novel, “A Time to Kill,” he was hooked.
6. While attending college, Martin was a waiter one summer at the Kings Arm Tavern in Colonial Williamsburg.
7. He is a serious and extremely knowledgeable music aficionado, and both his children are music promoters.
8. Martin played piano, in a rock band called The Chevaleers between high school and college. And that piano was an upright. “We had to load it into the back of a Ford delivery truck every time we played somewhere.”
9. Martin has met many of the “greats” but met the greatest — Muhammad Ali — on three different occasions.
10. Before joining AICO, Martin had a vacation planned, but Michael Amini was so excited to have Martin join the company, he persuaded Martin to start a week before his planned vacation, then he and his family joined Martin and his family on that vacation.

Home furnishings industry veteran Ray Allegrezza is executive director of the International Home Furnishings Representatives Assn. (IHFRA).