I CLOSE-UP

Women in business are finding
greater acceptance than in the past

GOING TO THE TOP

VICTORIA BELYEU DIAZ

Special to The Jewish News

Annette Langwald of Cruises Only!

24

FRIDAY, DECEMBER 18, 1987

onsider these statistics:
• In 1980, 30.5 percent of
all management jobs in this
country were held by women.
• More than one-third of
all Michigan businesses are owned by
women.
• More large Michigan corpora-
tions than ever (18) have women
employed in upper management
positions.
However, while professional
businesswomen may have come a
long way, baby, other figures indicate
they haven't arrived yet:
• Only five percent of the cor-
porate executives in this country are
women.
•An even smaller percentage sit
on corporate boards.
•In Michigan, about 66 percent of
the major, publicly-held corporations
have never appointed a woman to a
vice-presidential position.
It would seem that the plight of
the businesswoman is a mixed bag
these days. The Jewish News recent-
ly interviewed five local
businesswomen to find out good news
and bad news, what problems are be-
ing encountered and what the future
looks like to these veterans who have
been in the thick of the battle for at
least ten years.
Margie Mellen, owner of Marmel
Toys and Gifts in Farmington Hills,
and partner, Gaye Smith, started out
together 14 years ago when their
children were still pre-schoolers.
Working out of their basements and
garages for several years, the two
former schoolteachers moved their
business to its present location on Or-
chard Lake Road in 1981, when it
simply outgrew its in-home
beginnings.
"People were calling day and
night, knocking on the door all the
time," says Smith, now 43. "Our
husbands were going crazy. It got so
that we either had to get a divorce, or
get a store?'
According to both women, the
most difficult problems along the way
to establishing the success of the store
(a distinctly unprententious place

where educational toys and off-beat
gifts are featured) have had nothing
to do with sales promotions, securing
loans, making a profit, managing
money, hiring or firing.
"By far, the hardest thing in this
business is trying to shuffle business,
motherhood and marriage:' says
Mellen, 44. "How do I do it? With a
lot of guilt! Sometimes, I've even
brought my youngest to the store, and
kept her here with me. Sometimes, I
just let the house go. Fortunately, my
husband is very supportive, and I
have children who have learned to be
independent and capable?'
Smith, whose children are now 17
and 16, says she's not absolutely sure
she'd do it over again. Or, if she did,
she contends, she wouldn't get involv-
ed in runniing a business until her
children were older.
"I think, if I had it to do over, I'd
wait until my youngest was about ten
— when they're a little more indepen-
dent, and don't need and want to be
with you as much.
"I loved playing with my kids;'
she says. "I loved just being around
them. And (the business) just takes
away a lot of that. You simply can't do
it:'
Peggy Daitch, 41, manager of
advertising sales in Detroit for Vogue
magazine, encountered much the
same problem as a vice president and
account supervisor with D'Arcy
Masius Benton and Bowles advertis-
ing agency, where she worked for nine
years before coming to Vogue. A year
ago, she left that job and says she now
feels she has more control over her
time. Her hours at her job in Troy are
"pretty much nine to five?' and she's
able to see a lot more of son, Joshua,
15, and daughter, Karen, 14.
"I think it's extremely important
that you spend quality time with
children when they're in that age
group?' Daitch says.
Daitch, married to an attorney
who works in real estate and mor-
tgage banking, also employs a
housekeeper to help keep an eye on
the kids. "But I'm still responsible for
seeing to it that things get clone at
home, in terms of the children, our
social schedules, the house. All of that
is under my direction.

