Last edited Nov. 3, 2010, at 2:10 p.m.Penmac Staffing Services Inc. has sold to the company’s associates.
The sale closed Oct. 28 and was announced that evening at its annual employee meeting.
“It really won’t mean anything different to our customers, our business customers,” said Paula Adams, company president. “It gives our associates an added benefit. There won’t be any change in management.”
The company is establishing associates’ enrollment guidelines for the Employee Stock Ownership Plan.
All of Penmac’s 15,000 associates – temporary, part-time and full-time – will be eligible for enrollment after they have logged a set number of hours, Adams said.
Associates will be given an enrollment period during which they may choose to participate.
CSG Partners LLC, a boutique investment bank in New York that specializes in ESOPs, designed and implemented the transaction.
The ESOP would make Penmac the sixth-largest ESOP-structured company in the nation, Adams said.
During establishment of an ESOP, company owners sell their stock back to the business and stock ownership then is transferred to the employees, Adams said.
The ESOP is the most common form of employee ownership, according to the Oakland, Calif.-based National Center for Employee Ownership’s
Web site. Almost unknown until 1974, about 11,000 companies now have the plans, covering more than 13 million employees, according to the center.
An added benefit for Penmac founder Patti Penny is that it creates a way for her to begin retiring. Penny formed the company in 1988 with a $15,000 investment.
“It really is an alternative way, I think, for owners like my mom, for instance, who is looking for a way to retire,” Adams said. “This gave her the opportunity to still be in management. She’s still holding the CEO title and I’m still president.”
Penmac is a staffing and human resources company with headquarters at 447 South Ave. and 26 branches in five states, including three in Springfield and locations in Aurora, Marshfield and Lebanon.
Read further coverage of Penmac’s sale in the Nov. 8 Springfield Business Journal.[[In-content Ad]]
