PRICHARD -- Harry Zimmerman Jr. never heard his father talk much, which was a shame. The snippets he did get about Harry Sr.'s life were fascinating.
Harry Sr. was a child immigrant with his parents from Dusseldorf, Germany. They came through Ellis Island, and then Harry Sr.'s mother died and his father dropped Harry and all his siblings off on the doors of a police station one day in New York.
At that point, Harry Sr. was split from his siblings, only to reunite with them decades later. He wound up in West Virginia, where, after years of scrapping and working in different jobs, he started a plastics business that for a time was operating from the family's screened-in back porch.
He made plastic bags for food companies and hospitals.
Harry Jr. eventually joined the business, and as his father was getting ready to retire, Harry Jr. remembers him saying, "As long as you can keep this thing in the black, I'll leave you alone."
Harry Zimmerman Jr., 59, and a crew of dedicated employees have done more than keep Zims Bagging Co. in the black.
Today, the company makes plastic packaging for a vast array of items, from washers to pillows to heater hoses for automobile engines. And it's grown like crazy. After moving twice, and expanding four times in its current location -- from 6,000 to 65,000 square feet -- Zims will relocate part of its operations this year into a second site at A. Michael Perry Industrial Park in Prichard.
The business has grown from three paid employees to about 80. It converts more than 5 million pounds of plastic foam and film into 170 million bags and pouches per year. It estimates gross sales of $14 million in the budget year that ends June 30, 2008. And it has two new bag machines, the first of which has been in operation a couple months and the second expected to arrive this month.
Growth in today's market hasn't been easy, said Zimmerman, a 1966 graduate of Buffalo High School. The company has lost 10 percent of its business each year for the past four or five years to companies that are building plants in China and Mexico, Zimmerman said. Customers building facilities in China has been the most difficult challenge, with Mexico creating competitive issues from time to time, he said.
"Ever since Ross Perot said there will be a giant sucking sound, it's happened," Zimmerman said.
But Zims has reacted quickly and effectively.
One trick is to be prepared for last-minute orders. Zims' rapid response to emergency orders gives it an edge over companies that are overseas and need several weeks for shipments.
"If a backlog accumulates, we'll work weekends to minimize that, so we can be service-oriented with quick deliveries," Operations Manager Tim Burgess said. "We keep extra capacity on our machines to accommodate a shorter lead time."
Zims also has implemented new software in recent years. The newest programs to start this year are in sales and purchase orders, inventory control, manufacturing schedules and shop floor data collection.
"A goal with this project is for us to improve our efficiencies in reporting back to ourselves, regarding costs and production efficiencies," Burgess said.
Meanwhile, it has trained employees in lean manufacturing processes, which involves reviewing any process within the business.
"Once you start to break down a particular process, you want to identify and remove all non-valued added waste," Burgess said. Waste can include time, materials and any unnecessary steps in the process.
A longtime strategy at Zims to stay strong, when so many businesses are caving to international competition, is to sell, sell, sell, Zimmerman said. It has three salesman covering much of the Eastern United States and it sells to about 30 different states.
Keeping the company local and still powering ahead is about more than business, employees say. It's about family.
Zimmerman has moved his father's company forward, with the help of his wife and vice president, Janice, who worked for Harry Sr. decades ago. Now his oldest daughter, Tina Burgess, is human resources manager while her husband, Tim Burgess, is operations manager. Zimmerman's brother in-law, Ronnie Clark, has been with the business from the beginning -- 38 years -- and works as a shift supervisor for the bag department.
He describes the company pretty simply:
"It's a good place to work, and they take good care of me," Clark said. "They're good people to work for. ... I take pride in what we do here. I want to do a good job, and I've enjoyed my work."
Tim Burgess has been with Zims 20 years and said he likes that it's a family-oriented company. A core group of workers has stayed for many years, and some have children or siblings who have come on board as well, he said.
"I'm dedicated to my own family, and part of my drive here is to provide opportunities for other people in our county and our area," Tim Burgess said. "We know our youth feel like they have to go and find opportunities elsewhere.
"A lot of my co-workers and I started at the same time, so we've sort of grown up together, and there's a drive and a passion to help them provide for their families and their careers."
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