The Family Connection
Shortly after the completion of the Jenkins plant, the first of the Reser children joined the company officially. All five children, Marty, Mike, Mark, Michelle, and Mindy, had worked in the business throughout their high school and college years doing everything from building pallets to washing trucks to office support to unloading trucks to coring cabbage to making salad to working on meat chippers.
"We all came up through the ranks," Marty says. "We know the business inside and out."
Marty decided early that operations was not his strong suit, so when he began his career, it was as a route salesman. He's been in sales ever since, including positions as District Manager, Regional Manager, and Division Manager. He was named Vice President, Retail Sales in 1999.
"I went into sales in 1978 as a relief driver in our route truck division and ran vacation routes," Marty recalls. "When someone went on vacation, I took over the territory. I did routes all over Montana, North and South Dakota, Wyoming, Oregon, and Washington. I think I was probably the first guy in America to have developed a global positioning system in his head because I was always getting lost. A wrong turn in Browning, Montana, cost me 170 miles."
Mike, Vice President of Logistics, joined the company in 1983 and found his niche in Customer Service. He also oversees distribution and logistics.
"Customer service has always been one of the most important aspects of our company, and customer service has grown as the company has grown," Mike says. "I started with two people; now we have nine. We handle all the order activity for the entire company, which means our nine people field about 9,000 phone calls a month."
Mark began his career in 1987 doing route sales in Oregon but quickly moved into operations. He has been instrumental in the company's new plant construction, and 10 years later, he was named Chief Operations Officer.
"I was in Topeka when I was given the position and I developed further into it when I returned to Beaverton in 1998. That's the way it works here. People are given free rein-you take on something and it's up to you to get it done."
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