'The Hub' with Michael Allen sponsored by Manpower Richmond
Welcome to "The Hub with Michael Allen," the podcast that dives deep into the stories of community leaders and business owners who are making a difference. Join your host, Michael Allen, as he uncovers the untold narratives, challenges, and triumphs of those shaping their communities.
In each episode, Michael sits down with remarkable individuals who have dedicated their lives to improving their neighborhoods, towns, and cities. These community leaders are passionate, driven, and committed to creating positive change. Whether they are activists, educators, philanthropists, or civic officials, they all share a common goal: to build stronger, more vibrant communities.
"The Hub" also showcases the journeys of business owners who have turned their dreams into reality. From small-scale startups to well-established enterprises, these entrepreneurs share their insights, experiences, and lessons learned along the way. Michael delves into the unique challenges they face, the strategies they employ, and the impact their businesses have on the local economy and society at large.
With engaging conversations and thought-provoking discussions, "The Hub with Michael Allen" provides listeners with valuable takeaways, inspiration, and actionable ideas. Each episode offers a glimpse into the minds and hearts of those who are actively shaping the fabric of their communities, providing a roadmap for listeners who want to make a difference in their own lives and surroundings.
Tune in to "The Hub with Michael Allen" and join the conversation as we explore the stories of community leaders and business owners who are leaving an indelible mark on the world around them. Get ready to be inspired, motivated, and empowered to take action. Together, we can create a better tomorrow for everyone.
Sponsored by Manpower Richmond.
'The Hub' with Michael Allen sponsored by Manpower Richmond
Ep. 25 | Beyond the Blueprint: Building Success at AHAUS in Richmond, Indiana
What does it take to grow a garage-based tool and die shop into a thriving 100,000-square-foot manufacturing powerhouse with over 100 employees? According to Jeff Sheridan, co-owner and vice president of Ahaus Tool & Engineering, the answer is simple: purpose.
In this episode of The Hub, host Michael Allen of Manpower Richmond sits down with Jeff to explore his unique journey—from designing HVAC systems for luxury vehicles at General Motors to helping lead a multi-generational manufacturing company in Richmond, Indiana. After earning his graduate degree from Stanford, Jeff was looking for more than corporate prestige—he wanted to create tangible impact. That opportunity came in 1997 when he joined Ahaus, a place where his technical expertise could make a lasting difference.
Founded in 1946 by William and Irvin Ahaus, the company has grown far beyond its tool and die roots. Today, Ahaus specializes in custom automation equipment, work-holding fixtures for CNC machines, and precision machining. The company has smartly diversified its client base—from primarily automotive to also include construction, medical, transportation, and drainage systems—helping it stay resilient through economic changes.
Ahaus is also known for its nationally accredited apprenticeship program, launched in the late 1970s. While many local manufacturers moved away from training investments, Ahaus doubled down—graduating over 50 apprentices who now fill roles in machining, engineering, management, and even accounting. It’s a testament to the company’s commitment to people, not just products.
Jeff also addresses the challenge of succession planning. With no family members currently in line to take the reins, he and co-owner Kevin Ahaus are building a strong internal leadership team to keep the company locally owned and community-driven—avoiding the trend of selling out to outside investors who lack ties to Richmond.
This episode goes beyond machines and manufacturing—it’s about leadership, community, and building something that lasts.
🌐 Learn more:
www.ahaus.com
www.mprichmond.com
🎧 Subscribe to The Hub for more conversations with the people shaping Richmond’s future.
Welcome to the Hub Podcast recorded right here in Richmond, indiana. I'm your host, michael Allen, and on the Hub, our mission is to share stories of people making a difference in our region. In addition to hosting the podcast, I work with a wonderful team of staffing professionals at Manpower. Manpower is helping companies all over East Central Indiana find staffing so they can continue to grow and thrive. Find out how we can help your company at mprichmondcom. With us today on this episode of the Hub is Jeff Sheridan, owner vice president of A House Tool and Engineering located here in Richmond, indiana.
Speaker 1:Jeff, welcome to the Hub, thank you, good to be here. Hey, we go back a lot of years, jeff, and back when our boys started playing T-ball. That was almost 25 years ago. You and I were talking the other day I think that's a pretty good number and from then we've crossed paths, golfing and business, serving together on the board of directors of the Boys and Girls Club, and I can just tell you it's been a real pleasure for me to get to know you all these years and I'm really grateful that you agreed to come on to the hub today. So thank you for doing that. Yeah, thanks, mike. I'd like to start with our hub tradition, this is always like to hear people's answers to this. And, going back, what was your very first job?
Speaker 2:Jack, what was your very first job? Well, my very first paying job. I was actually very much part-time lifeguard at the local high school pool where I grew up. That was before I was old enough to get a real job and all that. And then I'd say my first kind of real job was flipping burgers at McDonald's in high school Did that for a while and that's a job.
Speaker 2:I think that builds character. I've always said that you know pretty much everybody ought to get a job in some sort of food industries. Absolutely Helps you appreciate potentially not being in that industry.
Speaker 1:Right, well, I did a similar, had a similar job, uh, flipping burgers at another place called burger chef. I don't know if you remember that and uh, but uh, you know, I think part of it, that age was part of it was kind of fun and but it's just uh, but uh, it's a kind of an entryway for a lot of young adults or teenagers just to kind of get the taste for what it means to work somewhere, and so yeah, so the lifeguard was this indoor pool.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I was in the indoor pool, I was. I was on the swim team in high school and you know they had open swims once or twice a week or something like that, and uh, so I just lifeguarded there and earned, know, earned a few dollars, uh, uh, while I was.
Speaker 1:That was probably when I was like 14, 15 years old yeah, I think that's a very common uh occupation for kids that are on swim teams or whatever they do the lifeguarding at the, at the gyms or country clubs or whatever right. One thing I'd like to ask you is if you just kind of share with our followers about yourself, kind of where you grew up, your family, education, kids, career, all that kind of stuff. Sure, that's a lot of stuff. Yeah, it's a lot, we'll work through it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I'll jump in. So yeah, I grew up in southeast Michigan, just north of Flint Michigan, a small little bedroom community north of Flint Michigan, in a small little bedroom community. My dad was a teacher in the neighboring school district not the school district where I went. My mom ended up getting involved as a business administrator at a different school district. So lots of education in our backgrounds and our family.
Speaker 2:But I grew up there and it's a huge automotive area of the country obviously and General Motors had a huge presence in the Flint area. You know there's probably just about everybody I knew had some sort of family member that worked either for GM or for one of the supporting companies and you know that kind of got me involved in thinking about manufacturing and engineering. I had a chance between my junior and senior year in high school to be a summer co-op at AC Sparkplug where they literally make sparkplugs, and that was a really good opportunity for me to kind of understand manufacturing. So I grew up in that area, had an older brother and an older sister and ended up going to what's now Kettering University in Flint Michigan it used to be GMI, it was actually owned by General Motors as a engineering and in management educational school, got my degree in electrical engineering there and co-opt with GM you know all through college and then ended up staying in that area, worked for the Buick Motor Division, which then became the large luxury car division of GM. That's also where I met my wife Tricia. That's also where I met my wife Tricia Tricia's, from Richmond, and grew up here, but then she also went to GMI at the time and so we met there and ended up getting married and lived in Fenton, michigan, just north of Ann Arbor, still working for GM. I was fortunate enough that GM paid for my graduate degree.
Speaker 2:I went out to Stanford University and got a degree in manufacturing systems engineering and came back and continued to work for GM for several years and then kind of saw that working for that large automotive company just a huge company, was not something that I wanted to do long term and so I had started looking around for different jobs and at the time, obviously Trish is from this town and I knew about A-House Tool and Engineering from her family and knowing Rick A-House and Kevin A-House from her family and knowing Rick A House and Kevin A House, and at the time, you know, trisha's mom had been diagnosed with breast cancer and so a lot of reasons, you know. As I was looking for jobs, I ended up talking to Rick and Kevin about the possibility of coming to Richmond and to work at A House, and it was a good fit at the time and so we moved down here and that way we could be close to to her family and a new, totally different opportunity for me to work for a small business, but still one that's strong in manufacturing.
Speaker 1:What year was that?
Speaker 2:We moved, made the move here in 1997. Okay, 97.
Speaker 1:Yep, so I'll back up some kind of obscure question. But back when you were doing the working at gm, what was kind of the hot car back, did you remember?
Speaker 2:what was kind of yeah, I think probably one of the big ones was the, the buick gray national. Do you remember that car? I don't know if I did. Grand nat, grand national is a kind of a hyped up. Uh, it was all. They all came in, just black, all blacked out. Uh, they had a turbocharged v6 engine in it. Um, you know, it's still got a pretty good cult following today. Okay, yeah, so the grand nash.
Speaker 1:I just don't, yeah, picking up that name so what was the big luxury car?
Speaker 2:you said you were working a luxury luxury car, uh, probably the uh, that was the cadillac, the big one, the cadillac deville at the time. You know, I remember those um worked on a lot of those, worked on the ultimobile products and uh, one of the things I had to do or got an opportunity to do was to a new car development program, kind of worked on it from the very early stages, did a lot of prototype development. But it was the, the Buick Riviera, big two-seater, or not two-seater but two-door coupe, but it was a luxury coupe. And then the Oldsmobile equivalent of that was I can't remember the name of it, but it was a four-door, had a big 4.0 liter V8 engine in it. I did a lot of development on those, those two vehicles, uh, fairly early in my career I think my, my grandmother, uh, had a buick riviera.
Speaker 1:It was like a full-size car but it's only two doors. Yeah, absolutely yeah it was. It was kind of a cool car, I remember. I mean hers was like a white, big two-door but yeah, that's cool. I just I think those things are kind of interesting.
Speaker 2:I mean, things have changed dramatically since those days and uh auto with cars and their production today and yeah, and I think you know one of the things I I think I mentioned to you when we were talking the other day is during that time I was doing a lot of heating and cooling system development on those vehicles and um with that I did a lot of travel, testing the cars and different weather conditions, but we tended to want to look for really hot weather and really cold weather. So in the summer times I spent a lot of time in the Phoenix area and in South Texas, kind of along the coast of Texas area, to get really hot, humid weather, and in the winter times we would go to Northern Michigan, to Northern Minnesota and up into Canada trying to, you know, find really cold weather to test the vehicles. And I always said I'm going exactly opposite the way I should be going right For sure.
Speaker 1:It's interesting you mentioned that about. I know you know Roger Golden. He was on the hub early on when we started this and one of his jobs was in automotive related and it was like he was one of those people that would take the calls of people who were upset about their car. I had some problem with it, so he didn't stay in that super long.
Speaker 2:That's a good character building job too. Yeah, that's another one. Yeah, that's a good character building job.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's another one. Yeah, so when you were in like your junior senior year, you got into the program that kind of led you. I mean, were you feeling pretty confident about what you wanted to do as a career back as a junior and senior? Because not every person knows that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, for some reason, reason I, you know, pretty much most of the way through high school I just I felt like I wanted to get an engine into engineering, which is a little bit odd because nobody really in my family was into engineering.
Speaker 2:Um, but uh, I was, you know, really liked the math and science type of things and, um, you know, some of the computer programming that I did, and so I think that that and the exposure through doing a summer co-op really kind of got me hooked on it. And I've said that to a lot of people, that you know a lot of young people coming out of high school these days they don't know what they want to do, right, and and I think that's OK, I think that I was the, the anomaly or, you know, the kind of a rare case where somebody that really knew what they wanted to do. But yeah, I've always enjoyed engineering. I've said for a lot of years I call myself an engineering geek, you know, I just like you know the understanding how things work, trying to figure things out, being creative, trying to come up with new solutions, trying to figure things out, being creative, trying to come up with new solutions, and so it's been a good choice for me.
Speaker 1:Yeah, no, obviously it's a great field, still one that I think a lot of people are being encouraged to go into. But I'm sure it was some hard work. When you were going through the college courses. I mean, did it stuff? I mean, what kind of student were you? Did it come pretty easily to you or did you have to? Kind of? I mean, nothing good comes super easy. But some people are really good in the classroom setting. I really struggled with it a lot. I needed a lot more interaction, did better in classes where I it was more, you know, going back and forth with the instructor or whatever, but try to sit and crank something out over hours. It was pretty tough for me.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, for me it actually the school part of it came pretty easy. I think I did. I worked hard but, um, you know, honestly, I had a lot of fun. I um, I kind of focused on, you know, getting a lot of stuff done during the day. You know, if I had gaps in my schedule or whatever, I'd spend time trying to study or do homework or things like that, so that I could have some time in the evenings to go and have some fun. I got involved in a fraternity in college and you know that was a great opportunity to get to know some people and and and also, like I said, have to have some fun along the way. But it's kind of, for me, it's always been a, you know, work hard and then gives you the ability to play hard.
Speaker 1:Yeah, was GMI, then a pretty big school.
Speaker 2:No, no, it was. It was not and it's still not. I'm not sure exactly what the population is today, but I think it was somewhere around what the population is today, but I think it was somewhere around. I believe it was about 2,500 students total, but it was a hundred percent co-op and so in order to sign up for there, you actually had to have a job, a sponsor, to co-op with, and it was alternating every three months. So you'd go to school for three months and then you'd go and you'd work at whoever your sponsoring company was for three months and then you'd come back to school for three months and then you'd go and you'd work at whoever your sponsoring company was for three months and then you'd come back to school for three months. And you did that for a five-year program and because of that schedule they had really had two student populations, so while one group was on campus in school, the other group was working at wherever their job was, and then you'd flip-flop and the one group would come back on campus and then the other group would go off.
Speaker 2:So my schedule like I was what was called a section and went to school, started out July, august, september, and then I'd work October, November, december, and then you know the winter quarter. You know January, february, march would be back at school and so on. And did that January, february, march would be back at school and so on, and did that. And so it was weird because it was like two totally separate student populations. That other half you never really crossed paths with, didn't get to know them at all. So it's almost like having two different schools of about 1200 student population.
Speaker 1:So your wife must've been on your schedule. Yeah, she was Thus getting together. Yeah, so a house tool engineering. You know it's a family, till this day a family-owned company, and, uh, based out of richmond. Uh, from what we talked, history of the company goes back to the 40s and, uh, some of the information that, from I understand, it was founded by William a house Is that right? And his son, irvin.
Speaker 2:I mean, and his brother Irvin yeah, I think they were both, they were brothers um in 1946. And then you know very closely, uh after that, um, uh, lauren, a house, um, jane William's son, uh, so he, he joined the company and uh, his brother-in-law, galen Miller, um, you know, came on board pretty early as well.
Speaker 1:And, uh, they kind of started it out like in a garage yeah.
Speaker 2:Right, yep, yep, literally. They had a home and they had a small garage that they started in and um and then kind of grew up from there.
Speaker 1:I don't know I'm going to talk about a little bit, but your your primary building, that you're in, your main building. That's about 74,000 square feet, Correct?
Speaker 2:Is that correct, mm-hmm?
Speaker 1:But it was smarter than that at one time because you guys added on to it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, it started, so we moved there, moved to that building in 1979. Okay, and then since then, we've actually had five different additions to that building to get it up to that 70, 74 000 square feet and this is probably.
Speaker 1:It's a lot deeper than this, but um company specializes in designing and building custom automation equipment right and work holding fixtures, so that's kind of an internet pool, is that? Is that true? Is that? Yeah, that is, and it's it's kind of a internet pool. Is that true?
Speaker 2:Yeah, that is, and it's kind of an industry-specific term. Not a lot of people understand that. But back in the really kind of in the 90s and then beyond the machining world, machining of parts kind of changed to what's called CNC machines, computer numerical controlled machining centers. They're basically just you know, programmable machines, but that really took off in the industry and so a lot of these companies were buying these you know standard CNC machines to machine parts. Whether it's for the automotive industry or construction industry, medical industry, whatever it is, they're doing high volume machining of parts.
Speaker 2:And in order to do that you'd have to design a fixture, a workholding fixture, to hold those parts consistently, very rigidly and so forth, so that when you'd machine the parts you can get consistent quality parts off of them. So the workholding fixtures are the fixtures that go on onto those CNC machines. And so we saw that it was really before I came to a house you know kind of identified that as a market that was going to be growing, and so we specifically we hired one or two people that had some experience in that that type of business and tried to become a key player in designing and building those workholding fixtures for the company. Is that still a part?
Speaker 1:It still is, yeah.
Speaker 2:It varies from year to year. Some years it'll be a higher percentage of our business than others, but it's probably consistently anywhere from 30% of our revenue to up to maybe even 40% or 50% of our revenue in some years.
Speaker 1:And you've got precision meeting, uh, precision machining services, right, right and heat exchange manufacturing solutions yeah.
Speaker 2:So the precision machining that kind of comes back to our roots. You know the company started out as a tool and die shop that was basically just machining parts for other businesses in the area and so we've always been a machining. You had that machining capability and as we later added an engineering part of our engineering department and we started building some of those automation machines and workholding fixtures, we still have maintained that machining capability and so for different customers we'll do some. Usually they're small to medium volume production runs of machined parts. You know it's not, it's more in the hundreds, you know tens or hundreds of parts as opposed to thousands or 10,000s of parts. So we've maintained that capability.
Speaker 2:And then the heat exchanger is something that built up over probably really the 80s and 90s, kind of resulted from what ended up being Vistion over in Connersville, indiana. Previous to that it was a Ford plant but they manufactured heat exchangers and compressors and all that for the automotive market. So radiators, heater cores, evaporator cores, condensers, because of that relationship that really kind of got us into the engineering side. When they were making the move from radiators that were at the time made primarily of copper and brass they went to all aluminum radiators and in doing that they put plastic tanks on the ends of those radiators and the tanks are held on by tabs which are kind of crimped over. They actually approached us to see if we'd be interested in trying to design a machine to fold those tabs over to attach the tank to the aluminum radiator. That got us into just all sorts of heat exchangers, understanding them and building a variety of different machines and systems to help assemble and build those heat exchangers.
Speaker 1:Yeah, very cool. So the industries that you're involved in obviously, automotive is one, medical, um, power generation, yeah, and uh, even defense, yeah, some, some defense, some defense. Is that a is? Is that a? Is that kind of ebb and flow based upon where the certain administration's priority?
Speaker 2:is in defense.
Speaker 1:I mean, or do you even notice that you?
Speaker 2:know one of the things that we we used to be very heavy into automotive and you know, at one point it was probably 60, 70, maybe even a little bit higher percent of our business and we've kind of intentionally tried to diversify ourselves. And we've kind of intentionally tried to diversify ourselves. You know that the automotive industry is sometimes challenging to work with. There are lots of pressure, schedules are very tight, cost pressures are big, and so it's always a challenge trying to do that work and do it successfully and profitably. But there's also a lot of opportunities in the automotive because there's always things going on, new products coming out, but so back shoot, it's been 20 years ago. We're trying to say, hey, we really need to diversify more, and so we started looking at what industries are, you know, growing and developing, which ones could we have good relationships? For us we see customers. One of the key things is good customers are ones that we can develop a good long-term partnership with. We're not out there looking to try and win those opportunities where it's going to be going to whoever bids the lowest amount. We want to have a good quality product and we want to have good relationships. So customers come back to us time and time again. So automotive has really dropped off. I think we're probably maybe only 15% automotive now.
Speaker 2:The construction industry, companies like Caterpillar, um uh. Cummins, uh, you know big truck type stuff, um, those those have kicked up recently. Um uh, we have a good customer been a good customer for more than 40 years that makes a plastic drainage pipe, uh, and they've got plants all over the United States and so we do a lot of work with that company. Um Medical you mentioned. We've done a lot of automation equipment for surgical devices as well as a lot of machining and workholding fixtures for orthopedic Zimmer, which is up in Warsaw, northern Indiana, where they make a lot of artificial knee joints, hip joints, all that sort of thing.
Speaker 2:We've done a lot of product for that. We've done a lot of product for that. So another industry that's been fairly busy recently is the over-the-road truck, you know big semi-trailer truck industry where they're trying to do more with their operations, to automate their operations and get more efficient. So we're pretty diverse. As you look at it, we're spread to a lot of industries and I think that's good, because those industries will ebb and flow. Sometimes they'll be very busy and then things will kind of slow down for a few years, and so we have to continually be looking at what's next and what industries are potentially growing.
Speaker 1:I really appreciate your comment about working with companies trying to develop a relationship manpower. It's really great. I love some of the companies that we've had the opportunity just to work with for for many years and it's it's it's very enjoyable because you kind of you feel like, even though we're a separate service company with them, I mean it feels like you're a part of their company and you, and it's fun to see how they're growing and people succeed. And I was just talking this I ran into this young man at the boys and girls club golf outing and, uh, he was just at the driving range and I was talking to him and uh, come to find out that he had started at at this company through manpower and now he was the production manager there. Yeah and uh. So I love meeting people like that or or people that have stories later on, uh, and see how they've grown with the company and maintaining a long relationship with when we can with companies.
Speaker 2:That's that's the really fun part about it, as you see those people and how they've grown and just success stories and that you know it kind of comes back to gives you that sense of purpose right as you see those people and how they've grown and just success stories, and that, you know, it kind of comes back to, gives you that sense of purpose right as you're running a business and owning a business is, you know, yeah, you're doing things you know every day because of what the business is and all that. But you know, when you start looking at the bigger purpose and you see the like in your case, the idea of providing opportunities for people to kind of start out in their career and then hopefully see them grow and build into something else, it's pretty satisfying and that's one of the things that we see too that we actually Kevin A-House and Rick A-House and myself sat down about seven or eight years ago and really tried to define the purpose Right. What is the purpose of A-House?
Speaker 2:And obviously we're a manufacturing company. We design and build custom manufacturing equipment. But as we looked back at the history of the company, we kind of got into stories about things that really stuck out to us. We looked at what things have we been involved in outside of the business and the community and where we really came and settled is that, you know the purpose is really to provide, you know, opportunities for people to do new and better things, new possibilities for people, and that's, you know, the people that we work with. Maybe it's a young person coming right out of high school into the apprenticeship program and then building a career from there, but also it's our customers, working with them to kind of see new possibilities and reach new possibilities that they might not have otherwise seen.
Speaker 1:Well, it's a good lead-in to the question I had, or something I wanted you to comment maybe a little bit more, because even in the late 70s, I believe your apprenticeship program, which is nationally accredited education program for tool makers and cnc machinists, I believe, and correct me if I got any of this wrong but you want to hire several individuals each year specifically train these professions and you work with purdue university college of technology and ivy tech. You still partner with both of those, Correct, yeah? And so tell us maybe a little bit more about the apprenticeship program. I mean, you're bringing people up in the field and a lot of these people, I suspect, are still working for you today.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, it's really cool looking back at it. It was obviously before I came to A-House, but Rick A-House and Lauren A-House at the time were looking at the machine tool needs here in the community and trying to hire people and they said, hey, we need to start training young people because there just aren't people out there that have these skills, because there just aren't people out there that have these skills. And so there was a group of other tool-and-die companies in the area that got together and were talking and said, hey, we need to do this. And a lot of them said, no, it's too expensive, we're not going to invest our time and resources into training these people. And so there were only a couple of companies that ended up doing it and kind of sticking with it ourselves. And one of the other ones that's done it for a long, a lot of years is Nixon tool here in Richmond. But it's been super successful for us because it gets those young people into the door and we we start.
Speaker 2:You know, when they start as an apprentice, they they work full time for us.
Speaker 2:We pay them a really competitive wage, but we're also training them.
Speaker 2:They're moving around different, different operations within the company to try and learn the trade and then they also are required to take classes, like you said, either through Ivy Tech, community College or the Purdue program.
Speaker 2:Some of them go and take some things at IU East but over a period of about four years sometimes it's a little bit less or sometimes a little bit more they will get I think it's about 8,000 hours of hands-on training as well as get enough education. So they end up getting an associate's degree in whether it could be an engineering technology program or a machine tool technology program technology program or a machine tool technology program. And that, you know, that's just been really successful because those folks have, you know, continue to be really good employees and a lot of them have moved up into different positions, whether it's been a supervisor position, a manager of a department. Some of them have moved into engineering. They've gone on and gotten their engineering degree and moved into engineering, project management, just all sorts of just some of them into sales, and it's really provided a really good resource for us to kind of help grow as a company, because we're providing opportunities for these young people.
Speaker 1:Any idea of how many have gone through this program? I?
Speaker 2:should have looked at that. Any idea of how many have gone through this program? I should have looked at that. I think it's in the 60s, maybe it's probably even more than that that have like started into the program. But I think we have 50 to 60 graduates and a lot of those people are still with us today Some have actually. We just recently had some of our first retirements that started out back in the late 70s or early 80s, worked their entire career with us and then have since just retired from A-House.
Speaker 1:I mean you're not a huge company. I think you're maybe a little under 100 employees, a little over 100.
Speaker 2:Now, I think we just looked at it, we're about 107. We've hired quite a few in the last two years because of lots of growth.
Speaker 1:But when you're running, let's say, 100 people I mean there's only so many people you can have in an apprenticeship program at one time. Yeah, I mean, what's kind of the max?
Speaker 2:Right now I think we have I just looked at it I think we have nine in our apprenticeship program right now. We try to do maybe two to three every year starting out because it takes, like I said, about four years to get through that. But we have kind of expanded it so it's not just machining and tool making. We also have apprentices go through as an electrician to get their electrician certification. We have one apprentice in engineering our mechanical design engineering department right now. That has started out and hopefully that'll be a really good fit. We actually had a young lady go through in our accounting department. She was starting into her accounting degree and we hired her in the accounting department and made her an apprentice and so we went through a very specific kind of created a program for on the job training as well as her education. And she's still with us today and has really grown and stepped up and now is kind of managing the, the accounting group. That's awesome.
Speaker 1:You recently expanded into a building across the street from your 200 industrial parkway site. I was out of town for your open house, but I did get to see some great pictures. Just tell us a little bit about that building and how you're using it, integrating it with your other one.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we well, like I mentioned, we've had a lot of growth over the last couple of years and especially what we needed was assembly floor space, because some of these automation systems will take up a lot of floor space. They may be 20 feet wide by 40 feet long for this full system and when you're going trying to build that system up in your facility, make sure that it's running and working. We invite customers in to run off the equipment before we ship it to their facilities. We just were running short on floor space. We were actually looking that we we may have to may have had to lease some space locally to find some extra manufacturing space for a short term.
Speaker 2:But yeah, the building right across the street became available. It's about somewhere close to about 25,000 square feet, so with the two buildings combined now it's about 100,000 square feet. So with the two buildings combined now it's about 100,000 square feet, and there's also a handful of offices over there. So we did take advantage of that and our accounting team has actually moved over there, which frees up some space in our place, but, more importantly, it gives us a really big space for assembling of some large systems over there.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I've been in that building over the years multiple times. In my recollection overall it's a pretty solid building.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I think it was in probably decent shape. Yeah, it's a really good find.
Speaker 2:You know one, the location being right across street is very convenient. But yeah, it's a good good space. It's building seems to be held up really well. Good space. This building seems to be held up really well. We did just some real basic cleanup and kind of painted the overall manufacturing space just to kind of give it a fresher look and feel. But we had to do very little to basically get it ready to move in, and so we've already got a bunch of projects over there that we're using for assembly space.
Speaker 1:So how many people are over there in that building for?
Speaker 2:assembly space. So how many people are over there in that building it will vary depending on project, but right now in the office there's generally about four people, four or five people, and then in the manufacturing area there's going to be six to eight at any one time and as projects will finish and complete those folks will probably then move back over to our main building and then we may have some different ones go over there to work on some projects.
Speaker 1:evan flow yeah, well that's, that's great. I'm glad you you know you're utilizing that building. It's not sitting there vacant, shifting gears. Just a little bit giving back to community with your time, talent and treasure has been very important for.
Speaker 2:A-House as a company.
Speaker 1:With Rick, kevin and you serving the community in several organizations and capacities and I mentioned earlier that we serve together on the Boys and Girls Club of Wayne County's Board of Directors and my apologies, but I really want to share this because I think it is kind of a big deal, because you're a pretty humble guy, but you joined the board back in 06, and you were board president in 16 and 17, which many people don't know. If you get into the leadership part of the of, like Jeff was president, that's really an eight year commitment. Yeah, yeah, cause you're second vice president, vice president, president and then a past president. So those are two year terms. So that's, that's, that's a big deal. Eight years, um, your board member of the year in no, nine? Uh, you're a board member of the year in 09,.
Speaker 1:A house tool in engineering received the Earl and Catherine mayor award in 2020. You received the Bob Rosa presence award in 21 and the champion of youth in 23. And you've served on multiple committees with the club. I mean, tell us why it's been important for you to serve the community in this way. I know you, you believe it or not, folks, I mean tell us why it's been important for you to serve the community in this way. I know you. You believe it or not, folks, I mean, he served in other ways to other organizations, but just why is that important to you and why do you think it would be important for the people to consider the same?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think it's one of the things I I didn't necessarily plan for or expect when we moved to Richmond. You know I knew that. You know some of Rick A House's history is, you know, served on city council, school board, those sorts of things. Even his, his dad, lauren A House, he was a school board member at one point in time and so I knew that they were involved. But, uh, after coming here to the community, um, really, I think with the size of uh, richmond, it really allows for for you to get involved in a lot of different things if, if you want to and and make an impact, Um, and I think that that's what kind of got me involved was, you know I want to make an impact.
Speaker 2:You know I think that this Richmond community has a lot of potential and you know there's a lot of things that you know used to be here, if you go all the way back into the early 1900s. Just a lot of, you know, just a really thriving, booming town. And you know I see trying, you know my personal efforts is how can I help, you know, to improve some things, how do I help get some things back there? And, in particular, I've always enjoyed working with kids and youth and getting into the Boys and Girls Club just seemed to be like a natural thing for me.
Speaker 2:Um, uh, galen Miller, who was a past president at a house tool, was involved at the boys and girls club and uh, shortly after I came to Richmond, uh, he kind of pulled me aside and said, hey, I think I, I think you'd be great to be on the board there and kind of plug me in. Um, but yeah, it's, it's uh super, uh fulfilling to be able to be part of an organization that is really trying to reach those, those kids A lot of them, you know, are ones that really need help. You know a lot they need to. Um, you know, it's kind of a stable uh organization in in their lives and uh, so it was just a natural for me to get involved and try and do whatever I could to to make it better, you know, to help out.
Speaker 1:So at least you don't get upset if I get to get it wrong. But I think you know we've the club every day. There's five to 600 kids every day, you know, at one of our local clubs. Yeah, just one of the units, right?
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:So that's, um, it's a big impact and, uh, they've been very fortunate to have you as a part of it. Um, so fortunate to have you as a part of it. So you and I are not, I would say, real old yet yeah, thank you.
Speaker 1:Thank you for saying that. I think it's fair to say that the next year is based on where we're at in age we're just two years apart Could involve some big changes for each of us. And so for you, I mean, what does it look like for you in the next five to 10 years? I mean it's you've had a family business I don't think there's another family member currently involved in in a house, so what's things look like like for you personally? You see moving forward in the company and maybe even a house in general.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's a good question, I feel like. So Rick A-House was, you know, president of the company when I came on board in 97. And he was, I think, pretty instrumental in trying to do some things with succession planning of the business, with ownership, and you know back in those days that actually the ownership had gotten spread out quite a bit. There's been stocks gifted to certain members of a family and he was pretty instrumental in kind of bringing that ownership back to just a small, small number of people. And then also he's been, as he is retired, back in the early two thousands and Kevin Hayhouse and I have taken over, excuse me, running the and managing the business. He's been very good about kind of pushing succession planning, good about, you know, transitioning of ownership, and so Kevin and I have been able to, you know, through some gifting and as well as acquiring stock, been able to get to the point where, you know, the two of us are the two co-owners of the business. We have equal ownership. Rick still has a few, you know a. Two of us are the two co-owners of the business. We have equal ownership. Rick still has a few, you know, a small percentage of ownership as well, but you know, in recent years it's been okay.
Speaker 2:What's next, right? How do we succession plan, as Kevin and I are, you know, potentially looking at retirement or stepping into something next. What's that look like? And so, yeah, we've been very strong into thinking about it. We currently don't have any next generation family members in the business and so we've really tried to make sure that we are building up our management team, you know, making sure we've got really good, strong people there.
Speaker 2:And probably sometime in the next you know could be anywhere from a few years to. You know, kevin and I both probably will step out into some sort of retirement, partial retirement and we just want to make sure that we've got a really good, strong management team there to run the business. And there may be a next generation family member that comes in at some point, but we're not sure. But our plan right now is to continue to own the business, even when we're not running the business and managing the business, and we think that that's still real key is to have that local ownership. Um, you know, we've just seen too many examples of of companies that, um, you know, have sold to third parties, sold to private equity, and then the business ends up getting run in the ground and so um, our, so our goal is to continue to own the business while we are no longer working there at some point.
Speaker 1:Well, it looks like you all have handled the dynamics of family working together very well. I mean, I think you guys are like fourth generation in your company and I'm third generation in ours and I've worked with my dad, my aunt, my sister, myself, my wife, and we've been fortunate to be able to have the dynamics where we can work well together. I mean, any business has its challenges and I'm sure that you guys have had yours now and then. But when I look from the outside, looking in, it looks like you all do a great job of working well together and everyone kind of has their space and what they're doing and it seems like it works well.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's one of the things when I was deciding whether I should come to Richmond and I should come to work at A-House one of the keys.
Speaker 2:You know, I didn't, I didn't know a lot about the business, um, I didn't have a uh experience in machining or tool making or uh that sort of thing, um. But the thing that I did know because I had married into the family is I knew the quality of the people that were running the business. I knew Rick, I knew Kevin, and so I didn't have any question at all in terms of stepping into a company, you know, in terms of how the business was run, the culture, the ethics, the morals, all that sort of thing, all very strong and I think those things of what's helped us to work well together, that we respect each other. And you know, kevin and I have kind of run the business as partners for the last, you know, almost 20 years, and I think that's we have a real open relationship and we've over the years we kind of divided responsibility so that we're not stepping on each other's toes and kind of get in areas where we each have strengths, and that's it's worked well for a long time.
Speaker 1:Well, you had time, well, you had the, you had the, um, the privilege of you know the time you were married before you came back to richmond, uh to uh, you know they could audition for your services and it seems like it worked out pretty well so uh, great, anything as we kind of wrap it up here, anything else you think that we should talk about as far as a house and what's going on, and we've covered the gamut pretty much.
Speaker 2:No, I just think you know, like you said, it's been a really good fit for me to come here and you know it's pretty unusual to have a kind of like an in-law in the business but very thankful that it worked out well and it's great to be able to be part of a small business where you can make a positive impact and part of a community where you can make an impact. And I think that's something that we need to kind of push and encourage other people in the community is to say, hey, this community is not going to get better on its own. It needs strong leaders, strong people to go out there and get involved in nonprofits, get involved in businesses and help them be successful so that we can kind of grow this, this town in this area, to back where it possibly used to be right.
Speaker 1:Yeah, no, I think that, um, there's been occasions uh maybe multiple in some people's opinion where we've, uh communities kind of been knocked down, but it seems like we're pretty resilient, we keep on getting up and brushing off our pants and, yeah, going at it, and I think there's kind of that kind of a vibe in the community right now where there's a lot of good things going on, a lot of uh people that are trying to make this community a better place, and we just need to to have just more positive thoughts within the community in general and, uh, take advantage of some of the things that we have moving our direction right now, so yeah, absolutely so.
Speaker 1:Uh, um, if any of our followers or followers are interested in more information about a house, it's easy A housecom. They got a lot of stuff on there and lots of ways to learn about their company. So, thank you, jeff happening. So, thank you, jeff, appreciate it yeah it's been great. That's all for this episode of the hub. Thanks again for listening and we'll see you next time for another conversation with a difference maker from our region. Manpower is proud to support the hub. Find out how they can support your business at MP Richmondcom.