Winter 2006-07
From Roofing to Inc. Magazine:
A Brenneman Family Journey
Photo by Julian Wiebe-Johnson '06
Long before running a business hailed by Inc. magazine? long before children, marriage, and college, there were four Brenneman brothers and one Brenneman father crawling around under the blazing sun, laying roofs in and around Dowagiac, Mich.
They laid roofs for eight summers, earning just enough money to enable each of the brothers, in turn, to go to college. All came to EMU.
Rachel and Robert "Bob" ?70 E. Brenneman hoped their four sons would use their education to do good. "We were always service oriented," says Rachel, who attended EMU in 1967. "Bob pastored for many years. He helped start a Christian school. "Making money was not our thing. We didn't even try."
Adds Bob: "I never in my wildest dreams thought any of my boys would be successful in business."
Eldest son Conrad majored in elementary education and envisioned himself in some kind of ministry. Second son Steve wanted to play college basketball and find a wife at EMU. Their third, Robert "Bob" E. II, wanted to explore the world and maybe help change it. Youngest son Ryan wanted to play college soccer.
Today three of the four brothers ? Conrad ?94, Steve '94 and Ryan '00 ? play key roles in Nappanee Window, a hugely successful company headed by Steve, who majored in business at EMU.
The fourth brother, Bob ?97, lives nearby, pursuing a PhD in sociology at Notre Dame. He is a former Weather Vane (student newspaper) editor, which may explain why he is the one who took time to e-mail EMU's alumni office last year about the success of two companies owned by members of his family, Nappanee Window and the Aluminum Trailer Company.
Fifty-Word Story
"I know it is terribly out of character for a Mennonite to be proud of his own," Bob typed. "But I am certainly proud of my brother [Steve] and his accomplishments and I wanted to let you know about this story because I think it represents a remarkable story of faith, family, entrepreneurship and social responsibility. It also speaks well of the EMU business program and of the university in general."
Majority owners Steve and Victoria Brenneman. Steve is an associate trustee of EMU. (Photo by Julian Wiebe-Johnson '06)
If you're short on time, stop reading here. Bob just summarized the story in 50 words.
But if you want to know how Steve went from mortgaging his house for start-up capital, from pleading with banks for credit (and being refused), from involving one brother and then another, from wondering if it was all a big mistake? to presiding over a pair of the fastest-growing business ventures in America ? ones that increase their profits by 50% each year ? then read on.
The man that Victoria Miller met her first year at EMU began his post-college life as a purchasing agent in northern Indiana but quickly grew restless and looked for business possibilities.
In 1999 at age 27, Steve started the Aluminum Trailer Company. Seeking doors for his trailers, Steve collaborated with an Amish farmer who had a small company on his property called Nappanee Window. In 2000 ? with virtually no money ? Steve bought Nappanee Window. By year's end Steve employed 25 people ? 5 at Nappanee and 20 at the trailer company ? all working out of the same industrial building in the northern Indiana town of Nappanee.
For Nappanee Window to survive, Steve had to string out his suppliers to as long as 90 days for payment while his small team frantically manufactured and marketed its main product, cargo doors for trailers. Both of his businesses hung by each sale. At one point, he owed an aluminum supplier $600,000.
Bringing the Brothers Home
Home for Dinner (No Matter What)
Each of the dozen alumni interviewed for this article referred to experiences and lessons they gained at EMU and how these influenced the choices they've made and their future hopes. Several of them said they were aware that financial success sometimes causes people to lose touch with what is truly important.On the environment
A little effort and imagination go a long way. See the "Environmental Award" section of this article.
On family
Make time to stay close. The Brennemans have opted not to observe the modern convention of keeping work and family separate ? on the contrary, they make a point of hiring family members. Children can frequently be found visiting their parents on the job. From executives to the shop floor, all are encouraged not to let work impinge on family time. Even in the years when his business hung by a thread, Steve made a point of having dinner and spending evenings with his wife and children.
On faith and service
"Mission" and "service" can take place through business. Nappanee is furthering His Kingdom too, says Conrad Brenneman. Directly or indirectly Nappanee supports an orphanage in Peru, World Vision, Mennonite Central Committee, vendors who treat their employees well, the Mennonite Economic Development Association, environmental causes, and EMU.
On EMU
EMU's cross-cultural focus does change lives. Of the Brenneman brothers, Steve went to Jamaica , Conrad to Honduras (in YES), Ryan and Bob to Guatemala (where Bob met the woman he married). Says Conrad: "I can't shake out of my mind all the things I've seen in other countries. It would be so easy to grow my own kingdom here, but is this the right thing for me to be doing?" With the social-justice lessons of EMU's professors lodged in their brains, Steve says that he and his staff do tackle the "thorny ethical issues" of doing business and of making the right choices, even and especially if one is making a lot of money. "I don't want to have a big ego," says Steve. "I want to be challenged. I tape pictures (of people who need help in the world) to my computer to remind myself of who I am and what I value."
While Steve was hatching his businesses, Conrad and his wife Debra "Deb" Miller '93 were living in Waynesboro, Va., where Conrad taught public elementary school and Deb was a nurse. After Steve acquired Nappanee in 2000, Conrad responded to Steve's appeal to give up teaching and head to Indiana to serve as company controller.
"I knew I could pick up accounting ? I had one course in high school ? and I felt he [Steve] needed me," says Conrad. "We are day and night different. I am the detail person. He is the visionary. I challenge him on stuff, but I'm a brother and he knows I care."
Besides, Conrad reasoned, this business opportunity might ease the pressure on Deb to earn money as a nurse, permitting her to give more attention to their two young sons and a third about to be born.
Ryan followed Conrad into Nappanee Window later the same year. Steve also attracted a business investor, Wade Wenger, a physician from Bridgewater, Va., who attended EMU in 1969.
In 2001 Nappanee Window expanded into recreational vehicle (RV) doors and earned a profit. With the September attacks many Americans shifted toward RV travel within the United States and the industry started cresting. Nappanee Window was positioned to ride the wave into becoming one of the key suppliers of doors to the industry.
In the last three years, Aluminum Trailer Company and Nappanee Window have together seen sales increase by an average of 50% annually. (Victoria's sister, Stephanie Miller '04, does sales at the trailer company.) Since 1999, the businesses have grown from 5 employees in one location and combined sales of $2.5 million to 350 employees in five locations (four in Nappanee and one near Los Angeles, Calif.), with combined sales of about $57 million. In 2005, Inc. magazine named Nappanee to its "Inc. 500" list featuring the fastest-growing, privately held companies in America.
Environmental Award
In 2006 Nappanee joined the roster of such companies as Alcoa, Rolls Royce, Subaru and Toyota in receiving the Indiana Governor's Award for Recycling and Reuse. The governor's website explains:
Nappanee Window has developed an innovative program that reuses rout-outs (materials leftover when openings are cut in trailers) from manufacturing customers. Nappanee Window takes a significant portion of the material that was previously hauled away to landfills and creates new doors from the recycled materials, and then sells the doors back to their customers at a significantly discounted price. Nappanee Window has partnerships with 18 manufacturing plants to reuse rout-outs, which accounts for over 27% of their monthly sales. Through the rout out program, 24.5 tons of waste material ? including ? EPS foam, wood, plastic, fiberglass, and fiberglass resins ? are diverted from landfill each month, resulting in large cost savings for participating customers.
Lead Roles for EMU Alumni
Today Nappanee's front office is heavily staffed by EMU alumni or their spouses: Ryan, the soccer-playing brother, is now an engineer and married to Michelle Thomas ?02; Evan Bontrager, married Tonya Ramer '90, and runs the business on a day-to-day level; Lavonn Hostetler '90 is controller and married to Eric '90 who manages the information technology.
In the manufacturing area, an Amish worker operates high-tech equipment. (Photo by Julian Wiebe-Johnson '06)
The Brenneman brothers, their wives, and the Brenneman parents are all Nappanee owners, with Victoria and Steve owning the most shares in Nappanee and almost all of the trailer company.
In late 2006 ground was broken for a Brenneman-owned aluminum extrusion mill in Goshen, Ind., which should be operational with about 30 employees in the next few months.
Beyond the Nappanee Window front office, the manufacturing section is mostly Amish. The work day is set up to accommodate Amish men from the neighboring semi-rural area to bicycle to work by 5 a.m., put in eight hours running high-tech machinery, and then home after p.m. That leaves them plenty of time to attend to their families, homes, land, and faith communities. Most of the Amish are related to each other ? three sets of brothers work on the floor.
EMU alumni connected to the Nappanee Window company in Indiana, from left: Bob Brenneman (Sr.), Rachel Brenneman, Eric Hostetler, Lavonn Duncan Hostetler, Stephanie Miller, Tanya Ramer Brenneman, Conrad Brenneman, Debra Miller Brenneman, and Bob Brenneman II. (Photo by Bonnie Price Lofton)
Orlin Yoder, an Amish production manager, says Nappanee has almost zero turnover. "We're paid better than anybody in the area right now." Besides, he adds, it's different from another job he had where "you were just a little number." At Nappanee everyone's names are known by the owners and squabbles are talked through, says Yoder.
It's also a place where talent and hard work are rewarded. Brian Hostettler, a 19-year-old Amishman with an 8th-grade education, started working at Nappanee at age 15. He now sits in the front office as a company purchasing agent. He buys $10 million worth of supplies each year.
Old-Fashioned Trust Factor
Steve credits his old-fashioned Mennonite upbringing ? complete with brothers who bonded for life while helping each other do roofing and while sitting in their parents' North Wayne, Ind., church ? for the success of his unconventional approach to business.
"We were taught at a young age to have empathy ? to try to understand how the other person was viewing the same situation," he says. This helped them to address the anxiety of their suppliers in the early years when the company wasn't able to pay them on time.
Tell Us About Your Business!
Crossroads will devote a future issue issue to profiling businesses set up or run by EMU alumni. Send us your candidates for this issue!We hope to receive:
• Your name and contact information
• The name of the business set up or run by an EMU alumnus. (Include the name of the alumnus or alumni, if it is different from yours).
• A one- or two-paragraph description of what the business does. In case we receive more suggested businesses than we have space to cover, it might help if you write persuasively on why 15,000 Crossroads readers should be interested in learning more about this business.
Send your entries to , or use the mailing address on the Crossroads staff and information web page. Thank you for sharing your ideas with us.
Conrad would communicate with suppliers about difficulties and be truthful about when they could expect payment. As a result, the aluminum man to whom he once owed $600,000, much of it past due, remains one of Nappanee's largest vendors.
Mennonite-style resourcefulness came in handy in trying to get Nappanee off the ground. Says Steve: "I've hired people with farm backgrounds, who are often Amish, because they can fix almost anything and keep things rolling."
Finally, the company benefits from the Mennonite-Amish "trust factor," says Conrad. "We are able to focus on our jobs, rather than on company politics. We are free to work with gusto and more efficiency. We get our work done, but we also have conversations about life."
With shared values and work ethic, the group gets through hard times by praying, encouraging each other and not blaming each other.
Says youngest brother Ryan: "Our relationships are extremely important."
More on the web:
Business education at EMU:
http://www.emu.edu/business
Nappenee website:
http://www.nappaneewindow.com/index.php
Indiana governor’s environmental awards:
http://www.in.gov/idem/prevention/awards/govawards/gawards06.html
