Roads To Success 3.4

Beyond The Mill

The Manthei brothers, cousins and uncles successfully rebuilt the veneer mill started by Ted and Ernie Manthei.  Conflict existed during that process and, as might be expected, it still exists in the company today.

“We fight regularly,” Tom admitted during his interview.  “Fighting isn’t a bad thing.  What keeps us together is everyone in our group knows and is committed to the fact that we need each other.  We don’t necessarily always think alike.  We don’t always have the same idea on how we’d do something ourselves.  But what we do know is that we need each other and there is a commitment to the team concept.”

“We are as different as night and day,” Ben contributed.  “But to work as a team we’ve developed a deep respect for one another because we see what each of us add to the team.”

Rebuilding the company from the ashes served to strengthen the family—although some of the older family members eventually left the partnership to pursue their own interests.  Their departure created openings for the other brothers who, at the time the partnership was originally formed, were too young to participate.  Those who remained have expanded the company considerably beyond the original veneer mill.

“Six of us are left in the business,” Tom explained.  “The core businesses are the veneer mill, we have three mobile home parks in the Palm Springs area, and we have a construction company.  And then we do a variety of land developments and different investments.”

“As a team through the years we’ve developed eight different businesses and combined we do approximately $50 million in sales a year,” Ben elaborated.

At this point in the original Secrets Of Success show we cut to something of a “who’s who” in the Manthei organization, beginning with Tim Manthei.  “I’m the director of the Manthei west coast operations.  I came out and started to build some RV spaces and it ended up being an RV and mobile home resort business.  We have about sixteen-hundred spaces now.”

Next up was Mark Manthei.  “I’m the president of the Manthei Development Corporation.  My responsibilities are the general, overall management of the company.  This company is really composed of three basic departments: the aggregate division, the Ready Mix division and then our contract division.”

“My role with the company is to develop the systems and the equipment in the plant so we stay as efficient as possible,” offered Dan Manthei.  “We want to make it as easy for the employee as possible, run as much veneer through the plant as possible, and get the most wood out of each log as possible.”

“I’m the President of Redi-Rock International,” Ben Manthei explained.  “And we are presently marketing one of the new products we just developed which is a large retaining wall system that looks like natural, cultured rock.”

Jim Manthei was next in the lineup.  “I am the vice president of Manthei Development and I’m in charge of all the heavy construction.  I’ve been with the company ever since it started and through that I’ve developed the heavy construction end of the business as far as working in the field.”

And last but not least, Tom Manthei.  “I’m president of Manthei Incorporated and we make single-ply, fancy face quality veneers here.  We use maple, ash, cherry, walnut and some of the more exotic woods.  Our products are used primarily in the cabinet industry.”

The Manthei Corporation is clearly comprised of a group of strong, independent personalities, each with their own way of doing things, each with a unique approach to creativity and problem solving.  So, how do these businessmen manage to overcome their differences?  Stay tuned.

© 2012 Philip Kassel

Roads To Success 3.3

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Starting From Scratch

Ted and Ernie Manthei worked hard to build their veneer business, enjoying growth and success in a partnership of over twenty years.  But in late 1967 their veneer mill caught fire and burned to the ground.  The tragedy made a lasting impression on all the brothers.

“I jumped in my car and ran down there just in time to see the roof cave in on the place,” said Mark Manthei, President of Manthei Development.  “It was an emotional, dramatic time because I think all of us had a strong identification with the veneer mill.  My dad and my uncle both had a really strong work ethic and they had raised us with that same ethic.  And we all spent time working in that plant.”

Jim Manthei, now Senior Vice President of Manthei Development Corporation began earning his title as a young boy.  “I had worked in the mill since I was about seven or eight with my dad.  And when I was about ten two of my brothers and I bought a little sawmill.  We set it up out behind the veneer mill.”

“That was actually our own little business that we were running,” Mark added.  “And of course it burned along with everything else.”

“I remember very well when it happened and I thought this is going to change my life,” said Tim Manthei, President of Sky Valley Parks.  “Oh, no.  This is an awful thing.”

But once again Ted and Ernie found a way to turn a “negative” into something positive.

“They were both about at retirement age and decided they didn’t have the energy to rebuild the mill,” Ben Manthei told the camera.  “So they came to our generation and said if you guys would like to continue with the business we will help you rebuild but you’ll have to run it from there.”

It would be a daunting challenge but Tom Manthei remembers that all the brothers and cousins wanted to take it on.  “At that time ten of us started into the business,” he explained.  “It was eight brothers plus two uncles.”

Rebuilding the mill from the ground up turned out to be a formidable challenge.

Tom clearly described what the new beginning was like.  “None of us really knew how to rebuild a veneer mill.  We didn’t know a lot about how to do business.  Most of us were very young at the time.  So, it was a time of tremendous turmoil and conflict, and learning how to build a physical plant on one hand, and how to work with each other on the other hand.  There was a lot of physical and emotional struggle going on while we tried to figure out how to put all these elements together.”

“It was a very difficult time,” remembered Dan Manthei, Senior Vice President of Manthei, Inc.  “It was probably much more difficult for the older generation than for the younger generation.  We were a bunch of young kids coming in and telling our uncles, our elders how to do things, and they did not accept that very well.”

“Whenever you have a problem in life, it’s also an opportunity God that has given you,” observed Mark.  “I think when you look at it that way, this was an opportunity to rebuild the plant with all new equipment, and all new systems, and with all new ways of doing things.  We did have a little bit of a struggle with some of the guys who had worked in the plant their entire lives because they wanted to rebuild it just as it had been.  And some of us younger guys were thinking we should build a plant a whole lot better than the old one.”

With a mutual desire to work through all the issues of reconstructing the family business, and with unwavering persistence, the Mantheis felt their way through those early years to eventually build a viable, thriving business.  The conflicts they encountered along the way and the methods devised to solve those conflicts would play an important role in shaping their future business.

© 2012 Philip Kassel

 

Roads To Succes 2.3

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Short On Strawberry Crates

My first interview in the family lineup was with Tom Manthei, President of the Manthei Corporation since 1979.  We spoke in the company boardroom located in an upper level of the veneer plant.  The large window behind Tom’s chair overlooked the main floor of the plant.  Tom is an amiable guy, and like his other family members, proud of his family heritage.

“It really began with our fathers, Ted and Ernie Manthei,” Tom began.  “They were brothers who happened to meet two girls who were sisters.  So, the two brothers married the two sisters.  They were dirt poor when they started out, doing any kind of work they could find to get by.  After awhile they formed a partnership growing beans.  With a lot of hard work the bean farming became successful.”

Ben Manthei, President of Redi-Rock International, added to Tom’s narrative.  “Ted and Ernie eventually left the bean-growing business and began raising strawberries,” he explained.  “And God began to bless them in such a way where they couldn’t even buy enough boxes to package all the berries they were producing.”

The shortage of packaging for their product, quite unexpected, would eventually lead Ted and Ernie in a surprising direction.

“They decided that making their own berry boxes was the way to go,” Ben continued.  So, they went looking for and eventually found equipment they thought would do that,” Ben continued.

“They bought a piece of equipment, a type of lathe,” Tom elaborated.  “But after Ted and Ernie got the lathe home, they discovered they couldn’t use it to make crates; it was the wrong kind of machinery.  So it just sat for a while in a barn and they continued buying their crates.”

The equipment sat in storage for almost two years.  It was business as usual for Ted and Ernie during that period until their story took a turn that many would describe as just plain old good luck.  The Mantheis would probably describe their fathers stumbling across a man named Mr. Metzelburg as divine intervention.  Mr. Metzelburg sold veneer for a living and he recognized the lathe the brothers had purchased.

“He told them they had purchased some of the best veneer equipment in the industry,” Tom explained.  “Metzelburg also had a friend in Wisconsin, a man named Simon, who was a retired veneer lathe operator.  He had Simon come to Petoskey and in about a half-hour Simon had the machine adjusted, and had beautiful veneer flowing off it.  So Metzelburg told them that if they could keep turning out runs like that he’d buy all the veneer they could make.”

“They set up the equipment and started running the veneer mill.  That was back in the mid to late forties,” Tom related.

Ted and Ernie Manthei put their veneer machinery to good use, and their business quickly grew.

“My dad was a visionary and he had always had a lot of ideas,” Tom explained.  “My uncle, Ernie, was more of a manager type so he could put wheels on the visions my dad came up with.  As a team they worked well together.”

The old machinery generated enough money for the brothers to equip the veneer mill with newer, more modern machinery.  The business continued to grow and the brothers ran it for more than twenty years.  They might have operated the mill even longer if it was not for an unexpected tragedy. 

© 2012 Philip Kassel