YOUR BUSINESS AUTHORITY
Springfield, MO
YOUR BUSINESS AUTHORITY
Springfield, MO
These medical-grade telemetry and holter pouches are used by customers including the Mayo Clinic, Mercy and Baylor Neuroscience Center. The pouches are single-use, latex-free and bacterial resistant – designed to help patients with telemetry devices become more mobile.
SBJ: What inspired the product?
Joseph Gies: In 1996, this little commercial sewing business was approached by a surgeon who worked at Mercy Hospital. He was looking for a disposable neck pouch made of fabric that could hold his digital monitoring device for his patients. The original founder of this company, Carolyn Nies, designed and manufactured a solution.
SBJ: Why is manufacturing in the Ozarks important to you?
Gies: We live in this area. We have raised our kids in this area. We love the Ozarks. We also believe in the work ethic, the honesty and family-orientation people in the Ozarks exhibit and value. Springfield is located in the center of this great country. We ship most of our products to all points of this nation: up to Washington state, to New York City, down to south Florida and everywhere in between. The company is not just a business for us, it’s what we call a missional business. It is a personal endeavor for us with a clear purpose.
SBJ: What is that mission?
Gies: Currently, all our professional sewers are immigrants from Ukraine and Romania. These ladies are knowledgeable, professional, kind and hardworking. It makes for a great work family environment that is stable and productive. We want this business to succeed so that it can get to the point that it’s generating a lot of revenue, not so we can get rich, but so we can share it with the Slavic immigrant community through employment and grow the business volume so that we can employ a lot more.
SBJ: How’s marketing going?
Gies: Hospitals are very difficult to get into. So, I’m thinking differently about how I approach this. Business-to-business communications but now also with a lot of digital channels that are available. There is a blend with B2C marketing, or marketing directly to the consumer. You’re sort of going direct through to customers, retail marketing through social channels.
SBJ: What makes your product different from competitors?
Gies: A lot of that type of product manufacturing has gone overseas where the price point can be a lot cheaper because the labor rates overseas are significantly cheaper. Something that we stand on and talk to our customers about is that, if you care about high labor standards and high-quality manufacturing and products that are manufactured right here in America, then KMedPro is your source. We deliver the highest quality that we deliver for the price point that we charge. Fortunately, we don’t have very much domestic competition.
SBJ: What’s next?
Gies: We’re looking at additional opportunities to try and diversify. We already have a couple of clients that are not telemetry-pouch customers, but their products align with how they’re set up, the machinery, the equipment we have, the talent we have and it’s repeat business. I’m looking to get more of that going forward so we can broaden our product line and have additional revenue streams coming in.
Taking shape on 3.5 acres just east of State Highway H/Glenstone Avenue in the area of Valley Water Mill Park are the Fulbright Heights Apartments – three 23,000-square-foot buildings with 24 units each for a total of 72 one- and two-bedroom apartments.
