Coffee and credit.(Member Profile)(Terry Rudd)(Community Coffee Company LLC)

Terry Rudd, CCE began his career in sales in 1984 after graduating from the University of Alabama, then moved into consumer finance--and eventually, into business credit. The experience and education he acquired over the years in the field of credit paid sizeable dividends in knowledge that he uses today in his position as the Corporate Credit and Accounts Receivables Manager for Community Coffee Company LLC.

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The company, headquartered in Baton Rouge, LA, where he lives, is the largest private retail coffee company in the United States. Community Coffee manufactures coffee for sale at retail and operates an equally large coffee service segment for hotels, restaurants, convenience stores and business offices. Community Coffee is located in 13 states in the Southeast and Texas. Additionally, they operate a chain of about 30 retail coffee houses, called CC's Coffee House, in Louisiana.

In one of Rudd's early positions with a lending institution, he was able to acquire knowledge and experience applicable to the credit field working with consumer home equity loans. "There was a market there, to take that customer's credit who was less than perfect and give them a loan. I learned good loan judgment and great basic training for collections."

In 1992, Rudd earned a Master's degree in finance from Louisiana State University and aspired to launch a career in banking. However, the job market in the New Orleans area in the field of banking was bleak. "It was almost impossible to get a good trust position in a bank in this area." So, he ended up working for a short period as a financial accountant for a government contractor, and then moved into his first business credit position at Zapata Haynie Corporation.

Shortly into this "dual" position at Zapata Haynie as a Financial Accountant/Credit Manager, Rudd realized the benefit of having been a sales representative for Nabisco Brands, Inc. for two years, early on in his career. "It gave me the understanding of both sales and credit." Working in sales helped him understand what sales personnel need in order to do their job effectively and how the sales and credit departments can work in harmony. "When I came into credit I understood their perspective."

At Zapata, now known as Omega Protein, Rudd got more intensive hands-on experience in the field of credit management. "It gave me my first training in business credit--managing a portfolio--and it gave me a taste of international business, doing letters of credit." He said he also got experience working with large companies such as Cargill, Purina and Mitsubishi. However, in this position he had to spend half of his time with accounting functions, and he desired to work more in the credit area: "My true love was the credit side. I felt like I was serving two masters, and I needed to serve only one."