If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. Ron Peterson, manager of the Minnesota Mining and Manufacturing plant in New Ulm, ignores that ancient axiom. He’s on a determined mission to revitalize what’s always been one of 3M’s most successful plants.
“‘You know, people look at you, and they say ‘oh man, they got bucks.’ But they don’t realize how much you’re working at it,” says Kentucky Fried Chicken franchise owner Gary Hopfenspirger as he stretches his legs and joins his hands behind his head. He’s seated now in his North Mankato home and he squints out his back picture window for his next sentence. After a pause, he taps his chest and says, “And all of these KFC franchisees are just like me. They work hard.”
There’s nothing more affectionate than a purring kitten settled in your lap, nothing more appealing than a frisky puppy who wants to play. America is a nation of pet-lovers. But, ah, there’s a downside. Pets, uhm, even the best-groomed pets, sometimes create unpleasant odors. So do swine herds, turkey flocks and the mess that’s left after you clean a stringer of walleyes.
Can a former Wall Street lawyer find happiness running a small Minnesota business? That may sound like the story line for a television series, but it’s real life for Herb Kahler, the lawyer who owns and operates Crown Fixtures, Inc., in Winnebago. “We’re happy to be back in Minnesota,” said Kahler, who left Wall Street to join a large conglomerate, then became something of a roving executive for the company. His assignments included a 14 year stint with one of the company’s subsidiaries in Minneapolis. Now he’s back as a go-it-alone entrepreneur.
Robert Walton Wettergren, a.k.a. “Mister St. Peter,” reminds you of the man that drives his Model T down the road doing 45, and while you’re passing him he’s glancing over and smiling like he’s the one passing you.
Rock-solid. Traditional. Bob Wettergren does things the old-fashioned way. When he recently celebrated fifty years of marriage with wife, Renee, he was asked their secret for staying together (this, during an age when half of marriages end in divorce). Bob said, “We work at [marriage]. And we pray together. When you pray together, you stay together.”
Sixty percent of American workers say they lack adequate training to properly do their jobs.
That can be fixed, according to Bill Russell and Jeanne T. Doheny. They train employees of companies in which you’d feel comfortable owning stock, companies all the way from Minneapolis to the Pacific Rim, even some companies whose names you might not recognize.
Al and Rae Ann Arneson seek their vision of the future where others rarely look – in the past.
They’ve dusted off historic labels and rescued long-lost recipes, freshening the tastes of thousands. Their searches led to 1919 Root Beer, Buddy’s Orange, Buddy’s Grape and Ulmer beers. Now they’re returning Hauenstein beer to New Ulm, where it was brewed until the company folded in 1972. “We’re bringing products back from years gone by, good products,” Al said. “We’re bringing back memories.” Rae Ann adds that “what’s fun about the products we sell is that good memories get better over the years. We’re making good memories better.”
He lifts a fifty pound bag of dog food from one wooden pallet and slides it over to another. He wears a flannel shirt and jeans, and his blond hair is slightly tousled. Here at Equity Supply in Mankato he seems just like any other worker as he unloads semis, helps customers and fills orders. But like so many other influential people here in southern MN, appearances can be deceiving.
Every Spring, Southern Minnesota Construction’s massive equipment snorts out of hibernation, eager to rearrange earth, rock and asphalt into long ribbons of roads. It’s happened every Spring since 1914. But that’s no longer the beginning of SMC’s year, and when freezing temperatures force the graders and pavers back into storage, that no longer signals the close of a year’s business.
