ThisWeek Keys to Success 02/16/2012

http://www.thisweeknews.com/content/stories/Key-Bank-Keys-to-Success-stories/2012/02/CallanderCleaners.html

For more than 100 years, the Callander family has been in the business of keeping Columbus looking good.

The family launched Callandar Cleaners, a laundry and dry-cleaning business, in 1906.

“My grandfather started the business in the spring of 1906, with his first store at 219 E. Town St., until sometime in the 1920s, when he opened a story in German Village,” owner Ron Callander said. “My dad moved the company in about 1945 to 314 E. Main St., then around 1955 he bought the property just east of Bexley, and we’ve been here ever since.”

Like his father before him, Callander and his brother, Don Jr., started out at a very young age working in the business.

“My brother and I started coming down to the plant at around maybe ten years old,” Callander said. “We started out sweeping the floor, then we started driving the trucks, and eventually we moved into working the plant. My brother ran the sales side of our company, and I managed things.”

Callander Cleaners currently employs about 50 people at its six locations, according to Callander.

In the 1980s, Callander Cleaners had 16 storefronts.

Quality and customer service are important to Callander, he said, and keeping the business the right size is important to maintaining those values.

“Dry-cleaning is a hands on business and we found that being bigger is not necessarily better,” Callander said. “When we came out here to Bexley in 1955, my brother and I started to expand the business, but we found that 16 stores got to be a real chore. When he died I downsized a bit further so that the business was a more manageable thing for me to do.”

Callander’s daughter Lynn, now the company vice-president, worked with company prior to his brother’s death, at which point Callander promoted her to manager.

“Lynn has been with me now since before the time of my brother’s death, and when he died my first thought was that I just couldn’t do these things myself, so I trained her to manage counter staff,” Callander said. “About five years ago, I promoted her to vice-president, and she’s still in that position and will be the next owner of the company.”

Callander said he won’t be retiring anytime soon, though.

“Everybody has a different idea about retirement, if you look at work as work it becomes something don’t want to do but I enjoy what I do,” Callander said. “I’ve made a good living for myself and my family so I want to give back to the industry, show my competitors what we do here.”

Callander said his company has always tried to stay with the latest technology in the industry and he spends much of his time now traveling the country to talk with other dry-cleaners about their innovations, making plants more efficient and environmentally friendly.

So what is the secret to maintaining a small family owned business for over 100 years?

According to Callander, it is about innovation, quality work and respecting the customer.

“There’s no big secret to that, if you only focus on money you’re going to lose sight of customer service, but with customer service everything else will come,” Callander said. “We’re very appreciative of the customer loyalty we have, we’ve got a few third-generation customers. After being in business for over 100 years you know it’s a nice feeling to know people have trusted us that long.”

ThisWeek Keys to Success 02/16/2012

http://www.thisweeknews.com/content/stories/Key-Bank-Keys-to-Success-stories/2012/02/Buck_and_Sons.html

As Buck and Sons Landscape Services celebrates its 40^th year in business, it looks to the future, preparing the third generation of Bucks to run the family business.

“We’re moving to the third generation of Bucks running the company,” CEO Chuck Buck said. “When I was getting out of the Air Force, my dad asked if I’d be willing to get into business with him. My brother was still in high school at the time but he worked the summers and then when he graduated he started working with us fulltime as well.”

The brothers, Chuck and Steve Buck, are 50-50 owners of the company, taking the reins from their parents in 1986 when Charles Buck Sr. and his wife Marianna decided to retire. Today, Chuck’s daughter, Mandy Rhoades, and Steve’s son, Jared Buck, help to manage the day-to-day operations along with managers Pete Marsh and Mark Crumbwell.

“Right now I’m just going to keep on working, one of these days I’ll decide they’ve had enough of me – but for now my brother and I still plan on working,” Buck said.

According to Buck, the company was one of the first to utilize computer aided design for their landscaping design and development services. The company has continued to be innovative over the years, Buck said, looking for ways to improve productivity and simplify operations.

“We may not always be the first to new technology but we’re always trying to look at ways to simplify and improve, like the CAD system. We’re part of the green revolution with our green roof technology,” Buck said. “That’s something becoming more and more beneficial since it helps to keep water from going back into the sewer system, and its financial incentives are that you reduce your sewage run-off bills to the city.”

The company currently maintains two green roofs, one at the AEP building and another at the Miranova residential tower.

“More and more people are looking into green roofs. Last year we did the Westerville Highland Aquatic Center, we installed a green roof on that which got some national recognition,” Buck said. “The Dublin Methodist Hospital is going to have a roof top garden that we’ll install in spring.”

The economy has been challenging for Buck and Sons like it has been for most businesses, according to Buck, but in this line of work the weather has also been challenging.

“We’re around 35 employees right now, it may get up as high as 45 but without snow this time of year we’re about as low as we go,” Buck said. “We’ve always looked at any way we can to improve services to our clients.”

Buck said the company started with a single truck and two mowers, growing slowly through word of mouth and a lot of seven day work weeks.

“We grew slowly, a little each year, and I guess we just had really quality people and great clients, and that’s what we keep doing,” Buck said. “We have great people and great clients and we like to treat them both as family members. I take it very seriously that we provide our staff jobs, and make sure we provide the customer a quality product at a reasonable cost.”

ThisWeek Keys to Success 01/19/2012

http://www.thisweeknews.com/content/stories/Key-Bank-Keys-to-Success-stories/2012/01/0119-Rosati.html

When Mike Rosati looks out his window, he sees more sunny days ahead.

The owner of Rosati Windows said his business is well-prepared, not just for the climate outside but also for the financial climate.

“I think a lot of the decisions we’ve made in prior years have helped us with the times we’re in now,” Rosati said. “We’re known as a trusted company by our clients, and we’ve saved a nest egg for times like this. You’ve got to have a reserve and have that for emergencies.”

Rosati Windows is a local manufacturer of windows and doors. The business opened in April 2000 with two employees in a 6,000-square-foot building. Today, Rosati Windows employs 168 people and operates out of a 60,000-square-foot building on Roberts Road in northwest Columbus.

Rosati grew up surrounded by entrepreneurs — his grandparents owned grocery stores and his parents were in the real estate business, he said.

“I’d been in the home-improvement business for about 30 years when I decided it was time to go off on my own,” Rosati said. “There’s a whole different focus when you’re a small business in a city. You’ve got to be a lot more on your game. You’ve got to be very concerned with customer service and the quality of your products.

And you have to be willing to give back to the community and take on issues to help out any way you can.”

The company lists its 10 principles on its website and marketing materials. All revolve around putting the customer first.

“Those principles were developed over years of being in customer service,” Rosati said. “These are things I believe in and want to instill in my employees. There’s no question that’s been very successful and we all understand the customer is the most important thing we deal with every day.”

Taking care of the customers hasn’t been Rosati’s only key to success, however; he said he believes in taking care of his employees, too.

“Taking care of my customers and my employees — that’s about as simple as I can get,” Rosati said. “We have very little turnover and have people that have been here for a long time, which is very uncommon in the home-improvement industry. It makes me feel good.”

Even in a challenging economic climate, Rosati Windows continues to add new product lines.

“We’ve kept a close eye on our expenses and our debt load, which I think is very important to surviving the next couple of years,” Rosati said. “We brought in a couple of new product lines over the past two years, so in 2012, we’ll be looking to maintain those and hopefully, the economy will get back to normal by 2013.”

ThisWeek Keys to Success 01/19/2012

http://www.thisweeknews.com/content/stories/Key-Bank-Keys-to-Success-stories/2012/01/0119-NorthstarCafe.html

The owners of Columbus’ three Northstar Café locations continue to serve up success as they feed their customers locally grown, organic and artisanal foods.

Kevin and Katy Malhame opened the first Northstar Café on High Street in the Short North in the fall of 2004.

By the fall of 2005, Kevin’s brother, Darren Malhame, moved his family back to Ohio, leaving behind a career as an attorney in Washington, D.C., to help run and expand the business.

“The passion my brother and sister-in-law had for what they were doing — trying to change the world and be the best at what they do — that was what attracted me to this business,” Darren said. “You could tell they were doing a lot of things right. They opened that first restaurant on the super cheap but still they won an AIA design award and a Best New Columbus Restaurant award right after opening.”

Kevin and Katy Malhame both spent time in the service industry prior to opening Northstar Café. Kevin said they were in love with the world of food and wine and wanted to be a part of something meaningful to them.

“We wanted to have a positive impact on the community and feel the satisfaction of doing something meaningful,” Kevin said. “So we wanted to open something approachable on a daily basis, serving delicious foods that are both good for our bodies and the world around us.

“It was a pretty idealistic goal and we were naïve, but managed to work it out as we planned.”

That idealism isn’t just lip-service, according to Kevin, who said the restaurant works with a number of local growers and certain local single-ingredient suppliers, as well as finding ways to work with larger suppliers to source specialty artisanal and local ingredients.

“It’s challenging to work with small growers and providers, because it takes more organization to get all that you need from several different purveyors,” he said. “We like working with Krema Nut, but we have to go and pick up our 100 pounds of peanut butter every week from them. “Ultimately, we hope that all restaurants shift to work this way. Right now, there are no other restaurants as committed to working with this type of single-ingredient ordering as us at our price range.”

Northstar Café opened a Clintonville location in 2007 and an Easton location in 2010. The three restaurants currently employ about 230 people, according to Darren Malhame.

The family also owns the Grandview-based Third and Hollywood restaurant, which opened in 2009.

“We have a lot of plans to continue to invest in the restaurants we have and grow them,” Darren said. “Three-quarters of our managers are also investors, and the thing for us is that we’re really proud of the work we’re doing. Not much can outweigh that. Being a modestly sized business is really a choice, especially when you’re successful.”

The Malhames all agreed that the keys to their success have been their willingness to invest in quality people, ingredients and their community.
According to Kevin Malhame, that means “having great people on our team, in our kitchens, dining rooms, committed to making people happy, with a leadership team invested in the business committed to the long-term.”

ThisWeek Keys to Success 01/19/2012

http://www.thisweeknews.com/content/stories/Key-Bank-Keys-to-Success-stories/2012/01/0119-CreativeMobileInteriors.html

Owen Connaughton turned his childhood love of vehicles into a successful custom RV shop that continues to roll out creative, one-of-a-kind machines for its clients.

“In the mid-’80s, I started building ambulances for another coach works company, then moved on to building custom buses, working my way up to plant manager,” Connaughton said. “Then in 1999, the company hit some troubled times, so I left with my vacation money and 401(K) and started up Creative Mobile Interiors.”

Two and a half years ago, the company expanded into its current $2-million Grove City facility off Interstate 71 south of Columbus. According to Marketing director Aaron Lane, Creative Mobile Interiors employs 25 people, including artisans, electrical engineers and business staff.

“We can basically do a custom conversion of anything with wheels,” Lane said. “We can turn a vehicle into whatever the heart desires — mobile marketing conversion to luxury vehicles to family vacation vehicles. Recently, we even built a second-story loft in a box trailer for a mobile ministry that helps troubled youth.”

Connaughton and Lane agreed that the economy has forced people to be more conscious of what they are paying for.

“We get people who ask us to gut a mobile home they plan to buy and instead, we offer to build them what they want from the ground up with an empty commercial shell so that they don’t have to spend money on what they don’t want, just to throw that out before we put in what they do want,” Connaughton said.

According to Connaughton, the economy has presented challenges as well for his business, but through diversification and partnerships, he’s managed to remain profitable.

“We’ve taken measures to make us profitable even in the down economy. We’re doing things to appeal to business buyers and we run a lean manufacturing process,” he said. “We’ve been building million-dollar vehicles for some partner companies that then lease them out — their success is our success.”

Supporting the local economy is important to Creative Mobile Interiors, Connaughton said, and it is personally satisfying to him.

“We do as much as possible with local businesses to grow our own economy,” he said. “At year end, when I look at my balance sheet, it is very satisfying to see all the local vendors I’ve spent money with that are also then contributing to the local economy.”

Being a locally owned small business means Connaughton can have a great deal of interaction with his employees and customers, something he said makes the hard work worthwhile.

“I get to know these people and their families,” he said. “And I get to shake every customer’s hand coming in the door and again when they leave with their vehicle. I’m not sure I’d enjoy what I do as much if that wasn’t possible.”

Connaughton said he believes the keys to success for his business involve putting together a team that believes in the common goal they are working toward and taking care of his staff, who then take care of his customers.

“We’re just a bunch of middle-class people trying to carve out a living in this world with simple honesty and integrity,” Connaughton said.