Western Region’s Southwest Area Vice President Patricia Austin, Retiring After 32 years, Looks Back on Her Career

The daughter of an Air Force Veteran who served in Vietnam, Patricia Austin grew up with the Exchange. Raised in Dallas, she and her family would go to Carswell Air Force Base for doctor visits, and then stop by the BX and the Commissary.

“We’d make a trip out of it,” said Austin, who has been an area vice president in Western Region since 2016. “As kids, we got cool stuff at the BX, because Mom and Dad would always treat us. We’d get a Frank’s Frank or an Anthony’s Pizza. So those bring back fond memories.”

So when the Exchange recruited at Texas A&M, she was immediately intrigued, and pursued an interview. She started with the organization as a college trainee in 1991, leading to a 32-year career that took her around the world serving those who serve. Austin shared thoughts regarding her professional journey as she prepares to retire at the end of August.

The early days

After completing the college trainee program at Fort Hood, Austin received her first assignment in July 1991: She was sent to RAF Lakenheath in England as a sales area manager. She stayed there for four years, becoming operations manager in September 1992.

“Going overseas, right off the bat, was very exciting,” Austin says. “Luckily, there were a lot of young people at Lakenheath with me, so we kind of became family and hung out. We had days off together and would on little trips to Europe to explore the area. We really enjoyed it.”

She left Lakenheath in July 1995 to become operations manager at the MacDill AFB Exchange in Florida. A little more than a year later, she was back in Europe when she deployed the Balkans in September 1996.

The rewards of deployment

Although there were still hostilities in the Balkans in 1996, Austin says that Camp Pleso, where she was deployed, was not in a dangerous area. But it was busy.

“Camp Pleso was in Zagreb, Croatia, so we had a lot of planes coming in and out, but it wasn’t where all the fighting was,” she says. “We served a lot of international troops as well as U.S. troops. We were kind of the hub where everybody came through. It was a stopping point to get necessities and go down to Bosnia, where the true fighting was.”

She did get the opportunity to go to Bosnia and Hungary, traveling with a Finance & Accounting team to work financial audits. She fondly recalls how troops reacted when deliveries came into Camp Pleso.

“You never knew when the trucks would arrive, because the trucks sometimes had a hard time getting through,” she says. “When one would show up, it would come through the gate, so the troops would know the truck was there before we even saw it.

“They’d come and help us unload the truck, because they knew that a lot of stuff they wanted was on the truck. They’d be unpacking boxes and see their favorite item and be in awe—‘I’ve got this little piece of America, this little piece of home, in deployment.’ It was truly a team effort. They supported us so well and helped in any way they could to make sure we could get the products we needed for them.”

West Point and 9/11 support

Austin briefly returned to MacDill as sales & merchandise manager, then moved to the Andrews Air Force Base Exchange in the same role. After four years at Andrews, she became store manager at the U.S. Military Academy Exchange at West Point.

“Just getting the Cadets ready for active-duty when they graduated was a big piece of what we did there,” she says. “We would outfit them in their senior year for all their uniforms. It was a major deal. Associates came TDY and we worked with vendors for months, making sure that we had the right uniform items. We were able to be part of the graduation tradition to get them ready.”

While she was at the U.S. Military Academy store, the 9/11 attacks happened, including the attacks on the World Trade Center towers, roughly 60 miles from West Point.

“As soon as it became evident that it was a terrorist attack, fighter jets began flying over West Point,” she says.

She was one of the many Exchange associates who traveled to New York City to support first responders and National Guard members working on relief efforts.

“It was sad to see, but I was awestruck by how everybody worked together at such a terrible time,” she says. “Just to see the unity of everybody in the United states, especially in New York, was awesome.”

Moving south and moving up

After a year and a half at West Point, Austin moved to Fort Jackson, where she was store manager. She says she has fond memories of Fort Jackson because her son was born there. The installation is home to the Army’s basic training center, so there were some similarities to West Point—but it was different.

“It was basic training for enlisted troops, so it was on a different scale,” she says. “But we were able to see the graduations, and parents and families would come to see their Soldier graduate from basic training. You could tell how proud they were. Fort Jackson put on a big show for graduation.”

It was also a higher-volume store than West Point, and while Austin was there, her general manager deployed. “So I was temporary general manager for about a year,” she says. “When he came back, I PCS’d to my first real GM position, which included Fort Gillem, Fort McPherson and Dobbins Air Reserve Base. The only one still open is Dobbins.”

That was in 2005; in 2006, she returned to MacDill, where she was general manager. A GM position at Maxwell AFB/Fort Rucker (now Fort Novosel) followed in 2008. Then, after about a decade in the southeastern U.S., she moved to Colorado in 2012.

Traveling west and becoming a VP

In August 2012, Austin took over as general manager of the Colorado Springs Consolidated Exchange. The assignment covered five installations: Fort Carson, Peterson Space Force Base, the U.S. Air Force Academy, Schriever SFB and Cheyenne Mountain Air Station.

“When you’re at that level, with the volume that we did, it’s kind of like being an area manager,” she says. “I was fortunate to have Shelly Armstrong as an SVP, and she selected me for a vice president position.”

That was in 2016, when Austin became regional vice president for the Northwest Area. Although she remained in Colorado Springs, she oversaw a broad chunk of territory.

“The most challenging thing about the Northwest Area is how things are so spread out and having to deal with several different time zones,” she says. “I had Alaska Time, Pacific Time, Mountain Time all in my area. So you’re dealing with three different time zones—plus a fourth, Central Time, because you’re always calling back and forth to Dallas.”

There were also weather factors, most notably in Alaska, where during one February visit, it was 55 degrees below zero, the coldest temperature she’d ever experienced. Then things shifted in 2021, when she became Southwest Area vice president.

“The weather’s the complete opposite,” she says. “It’s often very hot. And there are a lot of small stores in the Southwest Area, which to me are more challenging to operate than the big locations, where you have a lot more troops.”

A highlight of her Southwest tenure was Operation Allies Welcome in 2021- ‘22 during which Exchanges around the world supported Afghan guests staying at U.S. installations after American troops left Afghanistan.

“We had two locations, one at Fort Bliss and one at Holloman Air Force Base, where Afghan guests were housed for months,” Austin says. “We ran stores to support the guests and worked with the military to make sure all their needs were taken care of. It involved long, long hours but it was very rewarding.” Austin says that along with 9-11, Operation Allies Welcome was one of her most memorable times at the Exchange.

Family Serving Family

Austin plans to retire in Florida, near MacDill AFB, where she did two stints at the Exchange.

“We like that area and we have a lot of friends there,” she says. “I will probably do some sort of work and volunteer because I will get bored if I’m not busy.”

Not only did her father serve in the Air Force as a technical sergeant, her grandfather and brother both served in the Marine Corps and several uncles and cousins served in the Army, Air Force or Marines. Austin is deeply familiar with the Exchange’s core value of family serving family.

“It means that we take care of each other through thick and thin,” she says. “Even when it’s not the easiest thing to do, you’re there for the people you serve. The military make the greatest sacrifice for our nation, so it’s our honor and pleasure to serve them each and every day.”

And she’ll miss her Exchange family, but she won’t be losing touch with them.

“Some of the best people I’ve ever known have worked for the Exchange,” she says. “I’ve made lifelong friends. I still keep in touch with people I worked with at RAF Lakenheath 32 years ago. They’re some of my dearest friends. I couldn’t ask for a better organization to work for or a better team of people to work with.”

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