The daughter of two schoolteachers, 33-year-old Erika Urban is carrying on a family tradition. Rather than music and social studies, like her parents, her “teaching” involves helping women give birth to healthier babies. She opened River Valley Birth Center in March.
Daryle Pomranke’s heart is in welding, but his eyes are on the future of his business, Winnebago Manufacturing Company in Blue Earth. The refocus from welding torch to financial statements began 37 years ago, after Pomranke was diagnosed with an astigmatism that prevented him from forging a career as a professional welder.
Though now a farmer and having recently opened a 6,000 sq. ft. Sibley Seeds warehouse in Gaylord, Ron Geiger wasn’t raised on a farm. His father was a businessman and high school teacher who later headed the accounting department at now-South Central College, and his mother worked for a Mankato bank.
Photo: Kris Kathmann Hometown Smile Fairmont native leaves and returns to help lead real estate business through trying times. Wendy
Tania Cordes grew up outside Chicago, where her father was a structural engineer and her mother a volunteer on many boards and for charities. In a telephone interview, 45-year-old Cordes said, “My mother has lots of energy and I have some of that from her, for sure.”
In the 1980s, Richard Berry’s pallet business was a part-time venture out of his garage while he spent his days working at his full-time job. Now, 25 years later, Berry Pallets has grown large enough to warrant its own assembly building and offices. Berry oversees 36 employees and turns out 8-10,000 pallets a week, offering about 30 types of pallets to clients across the state.
Brian Mathiowetz is a gambler. Instead of dice, he rolls with the weather. At the time of his Connect Business Magazine interview this summer, Mathiowetz Construction Company was halfway through a three-month contract to build two roundabouts in Mankato, despite excessive rain in June.
He has been general manager of Crystal Valley more than fourteen years and would not have been if not for persevering through many setbacks and challenges—and skillfully turning those situations into assets.
Owner Kathy Depuydt manages Bradley’s on Stadium with son, Bradley, opening the bar/restaurant in the former Boomtown location on April 1, 2014
