Edward William Murphree and his employer, Flint Equipment Company “Flint”, appeal the trial court’s grant of an interlocutory injunction to Yancey Brothers Company “Yancey” to enforce a restrictive covenant contained in the employment contract Murphree had with his former employer. Murphree and Flint contend that the trial court erred in finding the restrictive covenant valid and enforceable. For the reasons set forth infra , we affirm the trial court’s findings related to the restrictive covenant, as well as its grant of the interlocutory injunction against Murphree and Flint. The record shows that in 1993, Murphree began working for Carlton Company in Albany, Georgia, and made the transition into heavy-equipment sales e.g. , bulldozers, excavators, backhoes six years later. Murphree worked in this position until 2002, when Yancey purchased Carlton Company. At that point, in order to continue his employment with Yancey, Murphree signed a contract that contained a restrictive covenant, which provided as follows: The Employee agrees that while in the employment of the Company, and for a period of two 2 years following his/her termination of employment, with or without cause, he/she will not, for the purpose of competing with the Company, in any way, directly or indirectly, solicit, divert, or take away, or attempt to solicit, divert or take away, any of the customers, clients, accounts or business of the Company serviced or procured by the Employee, in whole or in part, at any time during the last 2 years of his/her employment. The temporal periods of this covenant shall be reduced to the actual length of employment where it is less than 2 years. Thereafter, Murphree was employed by Yancey in the same capacity —as the predominant heavy-equipment salesman in his southwest Georgia territory —until 2010.
Toward the end of his tenure with the company, Murphree became dissatisfied with Yancey after repeatedly speaking with management about various and sundry concerns. These unaddressed concerns eventually motivated Murphree to meet with representatives from Flint, one of Yancey’s top competitors, in June 2010. Murphree claimed that during his employment discussions with Flint, he did not disclose his Yancey customer list but did discuss his general sales territory. And in the end, Flint expressed its desire to employ —and in fact did employ —Murphree in much of the same southwest Georgia territory, selling the same types of heavy equipment offered by Yancey.1
