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Promising growth, Utah-based investor leads board takeover at Ethan Allen

The Ethan Allen factory in Orleans was shut down by flooding two weeks ago. Photo by Fred Thys/VTDigger

By Theo Wells-SpackmanPublished Nov 6, 2026, 5:08 PMUpdated Nov 6, 20264 min read

A van is parked on the side of the road in front of a factory

The Ethan Allen factory in Orleans was shut down by flooding two weeks ago. Photo by Fred Thys/VTDigger

" data-image-caption="The Ethan Allen factory in Orleans was shut down by flooding two weeks ago. Photo by Fred Thys/VTDigger

" data-large-file="https://vtdigger.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/IMG_1481-e1793996354302-1200x899.jpg" /> The Ethan Allen factory in Orleans was shut down by flooding two weeks ago. Photo by Fred Thys/VTDigger

" data-image-caption="The Ethan Allen factory in Orleans was shut down by flooding two weeks ago. Photo by Fred Thys/VTDigger

Theo Wells-Spackman is a Report for America corps member who reports for VTDigger.

Three of Ethan Allen’s five board members were ousted on Wednesday in a shareholder vote, marking a successful takeover led by Utah-based investor and former Verifone CEO Doug Bergeron.

Ethan Allen, a furniture and interior design company, was founded in Vermont in 1932, and has long been an “anchor employer” in the state’s Northeast Kingdom, according to Commerce and Community Development Secretary Tayt Brooks. Today, the company operates manufacturing operations across the U.S., Mexico and Honduras with more than 300 Vermonters employed at facilities in Orleans and Beecher Falls.

Bergeron won a similar proxy contest at the retail tech firm Canteloupe in 2020, and is the founding CEO of DGB Investment.

He said in an interview Friday that Ethan Allen has not kept pace with competitors in terms of growth, but can reverse course financially by modernizing its approach to sales and marketing, among other changes. When Bergeron was told there was no place for him on the board, he decided to take matters into his own hands, he said.

“The existing management team loves (the company), but they don’t know how to love it in a modern way,” he said.

Longtime CEO and board president of Ethan Allen, Farooq Kathwari, was among those voted off the board this week. The company had announced in September that it would seek a new CEO.

The company’s outgoing leadership declined to comment on the change beyond a brief statement Wednesday announcing the contest’s preliminary results. An earnings call scheduled for Monday, Nov. 9, was subsequently cancelled, though the company still plans to release its quarterly financial reports that day.

Bergeron’s priorities for changing course at the company, he said, primarily lie in the customer-facing side of the business.

The business’ U.S. manufacturing facilities, including those in Vermont, Bergeron added, are at an increasing advantage as tariffs make international sourcing more complex and expensive. And having producers close at hand, both to implement new designs and access customers more directly, is helpful too, he said.

“I’m not a private equity firm,” said Bergeron, who holds a roughly 5% stake in the company. “We’re completely committed to the state of Vermont.”

Bergeron plans to visit the state next week, he said, when he will see both Northeast Kingdom facilities and speak with workers there. The message, he said, will be one of confidence — he foresees increased capacity and a growing workforce in the region over time.

“There will be nothing but growth here,” Bergeron said he’ll tell employees. “You can’t cut your way to prosperity.”

Brooks, who has been following the company’s leadership change closely, said in an interview Friday that those goals were “encouraging to hear.” He also hopes to speak with Bergeron during his trip to Vermont next week to discuss the company’s continued presence in Vermont in more detail, he said.

Local business leaders responded with cautious hope.

“I think whenever you know you’re an employee and you see upheaval, you know that’s cause to be nervous,” said Cathy Davis, President and CEO of the Lake Champlain Chamber of Commerce.

But the new leadership’s focus on digital retail as they look to transform the company could be positive for its Vermont manufacturing workers, she said. Ethan Allen also operates one retail store in Chittenden County.

“I would say I would be cautiously optimistic that these changes would result in, you know, a greater focus on sales, and recognizing that the facilities in Vermont are a valuable asset to the company,” Davis said.

Loralee Tester, who leads the Northeast Kingdom Chamber of Commerce, reiterated the company’s importance to the region, particularly given the area’s rural character. Even though the business’ Vermont workforce is a fraction of what it once was — Ethan Allen boasted 1,200 staff across the state in the early 2000s before a series of layoffs and offshoring — its economic power is felt keenly in those small northern communities.

Kathwari said in 2021 that a “shortage of labor and the escalation of manufacturing costs” had driven those changes. It’s a common story — and a common set of challenges — for such companies, Tayt said.

The wellbeing of companies like Ethan Allen are crucial to the region, and the state at large, Tester said.

“Our manufacturers are really the lifeblood that keeps things ticking in a lot of ways,” she said. “The people who work there and run those facilities are just — it’s so important to the economy here.”

Read the story on VTDigger here: Promising growth, Utah-based investor leads board takeover at Ethan Allen.

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Promising growth, Utah-based investor leads board takeover at Ethan Allen

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