Recharged Underdog.

Though his first job out of college was at General Electric and three decades later he's the CEO of the battery-making Rayovac Corporation, the career path of David Jones is not quite the straight line those bare facts may seem to describe. For starters, his first assignment at GE was on a dishwasher assembly line, not in electric generators; and the expertise he brings to Rayovac is not as an engineer, but in marketing and strategic development--applying voltage to the company's growth rate.

Growth might seem a no-brainer for this consumer product segment, consid-ering society's ever-deepening dependence on portable electronic devices. The once-moribund battery industry, now hovering at the balance point of old-economy manufacturing and our unwired future, is benefiting from advanced new chemistries--rechargeable alkaline cells, nickel metal/hydride and polymer lithium ion formulations--that promise greater power reserves and nearly unlimited flexibility of form.

But it wasn't the chance to play executive chef with the periodic chart of elements that brought Jones to Rayovac, but a shot at continuing a successful run of corporate restorations with buyout specialist Thomas H. Lee, the backer in his previous post at Thermoscan, Inc. Lee acquired the family-run Rayovac operation in 1996--and took it public in an IPO at the end of 1997--some 90 years after it was founded as the French Battery Company in Madison, WI.

Rayovac was underperforming and solidly entrenched as third in a field of three, but the new buyers liked the fundamentals of the operation and saw potential. And, while it had posted a string of four years with less than 1 percent annual growth, Rayovac afforded Jones the ideal lab to test his management theories. "I'm not really a gun for hire in terms of turnarounds," said Jones, pointing to his track record for energizing stagnant companies by implementing a structured plan of organic, sustainable annual gains. "What I look for is how to create growth in something that is not growing, or to create a growth strategy or a platform for acquisition from something far less than that."

Today Rayovac is still No. 3 in the U.S. market, with sales of $564 million for 1999, but that's No. 3 with a bullet. For 1999, the company's gains made it the fastest-growing battery company in the U.S., outpacing industry growth and holding a dominant market share in specialty niches such as hearing aid batteries. In the alkaline battery segment, the biggest market slice, Rayovac now holds a 19 percent unit share, up from 8 percent back in 1996. Much of Rayovac's boost has come at the expense of Energizer, which holds a 30 percent share and was recently spun off by Ralston Purina. Rayovac's other main competitor is Duracell, a unit of Gillette that accounts for some 35 percent of the market.

Jones claims that he's not fixated on overtaking the competition. "It's not an objective to be No. 1 or No. 2," he says. "Our objective is to execute our model." But he does have an ambitious expansion plan mapped out. Distribution is no small part of that strategy, and already he's charted impressive progress, with Rayovac now on the shelves in more that 80,000 stores, as opposed to some 35,000 when the takeover was finalized. Mass merchandise stores are key to that growth, with Wal-Mart alone accounting for 17 percent of Rayovac's sales. "We were in Sam Walton's first store and we're in every Wal-Mart store in the world," asserts Jones. "When Wal-Mart calls, I return the call."

The company's growth plan builds on its positioning as a value brand-priced 15 to 20 percent below the competition, with equivalent performance--as well as a new global strategy, rolling out in Latin America, and the momentum of advertising fueled by the star power of Michael Jordan. And what will energize the troops to sustain the impressive growth rate? "All of our bonus programs in the company, all of our stock option grants are measured on EPS," answers Jones. "Even our sales organization is measured on EPS growth."

Though Jones readily acknowledges the waves of consolidation sweeping through the corporate world, he relishes Rayovac's position as the nimble underdog. "We used to be real little, but now we're nipping at their heels. But I tell the organization all the time that the first time we try to emulate Duracell, the big elephant is just going to squash us."

And what keeps the No. 3 player from being trampled anyway? Jones is counting on No. 1 and No. 2 getting distracted. "The CEO of Gillette has other things to worry about than how Duracell performs. I only have one thing to worry about, and that's how we perform. I think any business that can focus itself on a single objective or single few objectives historically they perform a lot better."

DAVID A. JONES

Chairman & CEO Rayovac Corporation

"It's not an objective to be No. 1 or No. 2."

Age: 51

Education: B.S., Spalding University (Louisville, KY), Business Administration.

Family: Wife, Donna; five children, ages 19 to 27.

Drives: 1997 Porsche 911 Turbo, Harley-Davidson motorcycle

Leisure Pursuits: Golf, skiing, jogging; wine collecting

Dream Matchup: One-on-one basketball with advertising spokes-man Michael Jordan. "That would be a dream. For a moment I guess."

Favorite Greeting Card: 1999 company holiday card, with all the senior managers at Rayovac on their own Harleys, "In leathers with fake lightning bolt earrings like Michael wears."