Business Spotlight: Yarbrough Industries Inc.

At a time when the economic contraction is forcing many companies to scale back to survive, Yarbrough Industries Inc. is positioning itself for growth.

In the last month, the company has changed its name - from Yarbrough's Machine Shop Inc. - to better reflect its expanded mission of providing machining, fabrication and hydraulics services.

And owner Rusty Reynaud has acquired new equipment in the past several months so his business can quickly meet increased demand once the recession eases.

"We've just seized the opportunity to buy some machinery that wouldn't ordinarily be available," says Reynaud, pointing to a $75,000 computer-controlled milling machine that broadens the company's scope of work.

That flexibility wouldn't be possible if the business hadn't grown at a sustainable pace through the years and the remained debt-free since the mid-1990s, he says.

In the last four years, Yarbrough's business has increased 20 percent, though Reynaud says recent years have been flat. "Right now, I'm happy to be flat," he adds. "When things slow down, we can kind of slow down with it and survive."

A pallet-dispensing machine

Yarbrough Industries began in 1946 in a residential garage just north of Kearney Street. Reynaud's grandparents, Leonard and Norma Yarbrough, started with automotive repair, Reynaud says.

His grandfather performed repairs, and his grandmother ran parts and was the face of the company. "She deserves equal billing," Reynaud says.

Over time, the Yarbroughs did an increasing amount of truck repairs and machine work for Hiland Dairy, Foremost Dairy and 7-Up. To accommodate the larger jobs, the business moved to East Kearney Street, where a locomotive parked out front attracted clients.

In 1971, Reynaud's father, Gary, bought the business from his father-in-law and three years later, moved it to its current location, 514 N. Fremont Ave. By then, the shop focused mostly on machining. And while the business grew, its largest expansion wasn't until the mid-1980s.

Reynaud's dad was an inventor, he says, and was looking for something they could make and sell to increase cash flow. The answer was the Pal-O-Matic, a pallet-dispensing machine.

"We (went from) a little company in small-town Springfield, Mo., to dealing on the national level and going to trade shows in Chicago," recalls Reynaud, who joined the family business about the time the Pal-O-Matic hit the market. "It was quite a learning experience for all of us."

The Pal-O-Matic is now in factories across the U.S., Canada, Mexico and South America, Reynaud says. Its success brought changes: a more sophisticated handling of accounts and a new building, equipment and opportunities.

"As we've grown and added personnel and machinery, we've found we can do more general fabrication and do more work for the local community while we're building Pal-O-Matic," Reynaud says.

Among the newer machinery is a water jet cutter Reynaud picked up about two years ago. The machine allows staff to precisely cut virtually any material, including concrete, stainless steel and rubber. That has allowed Reynaud to pursue a wider variety of fabrication jobs and to hire a designer and marketing manager to help him land those jobs.

It also allows Yarbrough Industries to do most of the cutting needed in its machine shop.

"(That) saves the customer a bucket of money," says Eric Summerville, the company's sales optimization coordinator.

The hydraulics area is the latest to expand. The company initially bought hydraulic assemblies but soon realized it would be more cost-effective to build them in-house.

"We were going to St. Louis and Kansas City to get our hydraulic components," Reynaud says. "We said, 'Hey, maybe we ought to be selling some of these things ourselves.'"

Yarbrough Industries is now a distributor for Eaton Hydraulics, a $15 billion publicly traded company (NYSE: ETN), which has resulted in an "explosion of growth for us," Reynaud says.

Crafting customers

With the hydraulics, fabrication and machine departments now about equally weighted, Reynaud says he's better able to serve customers' needs.

CMC Recycling, 634 E. Phelps St., has probably used every service Yarbrough offers, says general manager Bob McCarty. "They do cylinder work, machine work, repairs, fabrication - they've done a little bit of everything," McCarty says.

The relationship between Yarbrough and CMC likely dates back to Yarbrough's beginnings, McCarty says.

"We consider Yarbrough more than just a ... vendor. I guess you would consider them a partner," he says.

That's something Reynaud takes pride in. "As long as we continue to deliver, they'll just keep coming back," he says.[[In-content Ad]]