Hockenbergs’ contract and design team. Clockwise from
top left: Paul Sinnott, Paul Parr, John Craft and Robert Taylor.
In the Know
by Ann Summers
“E
verybody knows Hockenbergs.”
This is the sort of comment one hears in Omaha when
dropping the name of this restaurant design/supply company
around anyone in a business that has a kitchen. A certain familiarity
stands to reason; Hockenbergs has been around since 1908
and especially in the Midwest, that’s a heck of a lifespan. In the
collectibles world, this makes you an antique. In the commercial
world, it makes you really good at building and keeping
a positive brand.
Hold on, you may say; successful companies don’t have to
be old. Warren Buffet probably has socks older than some of the
best companies out there. It doesn’t have to take a century to make
a name for yourself. And yet today, Hockenbergs is still a thriving
part of Omaha’s food service and restaurant biz, and there may
be a few surprises in store about this company that originated in
Iowa, moved to Nebraska and is spreading beautiful, well-equipped
kitchens and dining rooms across the Midwest and to the coasts.
“Not only does Hockenbergs provide
years of experience with projects
and customers, they can offer
expertise on a huge range
of concerns.”
It turns out that what separates great companies from so-so
ones may have everything to do with time, or at least the use of
it. President, Tom Schrack Jr., says that the continued success of
Hockenbergs is due to their long practice of building trust and
good relationships: relationships with their customers, with their
sales team members, with their vendors, and with their source
16
manufacturers of everything from glass and table wares, to stainless
ladles to recycled bamboo patio furniture, to catering carts and
storage, to workhorse American-made ranges, to full restaurant
and cafeteria furnishings and fittings, right down to the electronic
ordering systems.
Tom Jr. says that in terms of both vendors and customers,
building relationships is more important than selling a certain
brand or pushing certain products or models. And as his father,
Tom Schrack Sr., believed, a sense of trust is much more important
than chasing a buck. And let’s face it, no supplier one can stay ahead
in the business selling nothing but trendy immersion circulators.
Hockenbergs may be in the know, and it’s neither gathering dust
nor growing moss. Both Tom Jr., and his brother, Tim Schrack,
stress the importance of staying lean as a company, but they
also attribute Hockenbergs’ particular reputation for cultivating
long-time customers, wherein some 80% of their sales come from
20% of their clients. They also do a lot of education in their sales
meetings, and their sales group spends a great deal of time with the
manufacturers, forming a feedback loop of information that has,
at its core, transparency about the products and their specs. As a
result, Hockenbergs has increased sales by 20% since last year alone,
has expanded to five different locations with their own sales and
distribution, and completed over 500 projects last year. Someone
(or someones) is/are clearly doing something right.
But what do I know? Let’s get some expertise in here, shall
we? Financial writer, Bob Seawright is the Chief Investment &
Information Officer for Madison Avenue Securities, and writes,
in his blog “As I routinely emphasize the best performers in
all probabilistic fields dwell on process. This is true for great
value investors, great poker players, and great baseball players ...
Maintaining good process is really hard to do psychologically,
emotionally, and organizationally. But it is absolutely imperative