Business Person of the Year 2010 – Runner-Up
In roundabout fashion, sour has become deliciously sweet for Bryan Sweet. To begin, when he was only age four, his father and mother’s marriage soured down in Blue Earth. Then Dad decided to live much closer to Mankato and would not utter another word to Bryan the rest of his life. It was painful.
“Many businesses manufacture hardware, many produce software; we do both,” said Mark Gaalswyk, owner and CEO of Easy Automation, Inc. “Our business hits dead center on the line where those two meet.”
CEO of $2.5 billion Fairmont corporation ranked No. 184 on Forbes 500 listing of privately owned businesses.
A Mankatoan, upon first learning of Rosen’s Diversified and its $2.5 billion beef processing and agriculture-related corporate empire, likely would begin thinking of Chief Executive Officer Tom Rosen as the “Glen Taylor of Fairmont.”
Fairmont: AdMfg. – Owner Ruth Theobald founded AdMfg Inc. on January 1. Her career path has taken many twists and turns, yet seems a perfect background for her current venture.
Le Center: ABC Office Supplies – 37-year-old Brad Arndt was homegrown, graduated from Le Center High, and majored in multi-housing management at college.
St. Peter: Bendura – When starting injection molding company Rolco in 1980, Vern Olson also had a “rep company” called Olson Sales LLC.
17-employee Fairmont business excels in little-known industry. Photo by Jeff Silker The business partnership represented by a windmill logo may be one of the best-kept secrets in southern Minnesota, even though the partnership provides multi-faceted services to a variety of clients. Other area business owners and entrepreneurs don’t necessarily know about it, despite its location on Fairmont’s [...]
Fairmont: Olive Leaf Pantry – Selling hard-to-find grocery, dairy, and frozen items benefiting people whose bodies can’t tolerate gluten, lactose, nuts, eggs, soy, tree nuts or other foods.
Mankato: DCS Fitness – “I decided I wanted to begin competing in figure and bodybuilding—that’s what started the idea of opening DCS Fitness.”
Mankato: WOW! Zone – Over the last six years, Pam and Doug DeMarce were regularly discussing “doing something” because of their running out of space on Victory Drive to expand.
