Kolar's moving after 43 years

Typewriters are no longer the name of the game for Kolar Business Machines. Try high-end computers for such applications as mapping the genome and triangulation for B-2 bombers.

After 43 years of doing business at 1136 St. Louis St., Kolar Business Machines has outgrown that location and will July 1 move to a 2329 W. Division.

Simple beginnings

Kolar Business Machines was founded in 1958 by Marion Kolar, who sold the company in 1994 to Jeff Hertell.

Hertell said Kolar still owns the building on St. Louis Street, and he leased the space from Kolar after purchasing the company.At the time he bought the company, Hertell said, about 94 percent of its revenues came from typewriter sales and maintenance.

Now the company has diversified, and typewriter sales and maintenance accounts for only about 10 percent of overall revenue, because "you can buy a highly featured computer now for about the same price as a typewriter."

Hertell noted, though, that the typewriter repair service offered by Kolar's is still the largest in the area.

"When I bought the business, we were a reseller of typewriters, meaning we bought fully configured typewriters from IBM, for example, marked them up and sold them to the consumer. We have now evolved into a light manufacturing business whereby we design, configure, ship and support our own line of high-end computers," Hertell said.

That change requires more space, and more importantly, a different type of space, Hertell said.

The new location will enable Kolar Business Machines to have a more efficient shipping and receiving system, and it also offers updated technology for computer configuration and repair.

A changing world

"This (location on St. Louis Street) was set up as a retail place, with all the big windows, and (it) was a showroom ... people would come in and walk around and plink on the typewriters; they had little demo carts set up," Hertell said.

"The world doesn't work like that anymore. People buy over the Internet, or they buy from Office Max ... they don't buy from little places like Kolar's anymore."

And even if they did, Hertell said, the computers the company now manufactures aren't for the everyday consumer, so most of them don't stay in this area.

"One of our more interesting projects (is) ... to a company in north St. Paul, Minn., that is the world leader in gene mapping, mapping the genome; our computers are used to control the gene-mapping machines," Hertell said. "The gene-mapping machines are the product. Our computer just runs that product for them."

Kolar's also manufactures the control computer for part of the triangulation function of the B-2 bombers used by the U.S. military, Hertell said.

Entrepreneurial spirit

In addition to diversifying Kolar's services and products, Hertell also has used the company as a starting point for three other technology-related companies he owns.

Those companies are Data Imaging Supplies, which specializes in printers and printing supplies, a commercial and specialty printing and packaging company, and X-Tec, which offers printer and duplicator maintenance for Xerox equipment.

"The management philosophy is that whenever we have a business idea, and often they come from employees, we use Kolar's as a greenhouse to get them established. They use Kolar technology, Kolar financing, Kolar personnel, Kolar expertise and Kolar vendor lines," Hertell said.

The new ventures generally remain part of Kolar's for a year or two, then they spin off into separate, independent companies.

"The only way you can really make a profit center responsible is to disengage them from the parent at some point. They've got to stand on their own, so you know whether or not (it's) profitable," he said.