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By FBNews.net
A look at how small business owners tackled a challenge
Who? Euclid Industrial Maintenance and Cleaning Contractors Inc. of Cleveland.
Did what? Handed a business down through four generations of one family over the course of 100 years.
When? The late Benjamin Presser founded the company in 1903 as a window-washing enterprise on Euclid Avenue. Today, it´s a full-service cleaning company on East 40th Street that´s run by his grandson, Martin Presser, and great-grandson, Mark Presser.
The past: The story of Euclid Industrial Maintenance is a tale of family, commitment and loyalty, of Presser husbands, wives and children working with often multiple generations of employee families to grow the business.
There´s window-cleaning supervisor Bob Patterson who came on board in 1956, general supervisor Danny Kocevar who counts 43 years of employment, and manager Jacquelyn Motz whose tenure goes back 30 years.
"It reflects a lot on the integrity of the company when you treat your employees the way we do," Martin Presser said.
In fact, Martin Presser, CEO, whose wife Carol, company president, has done bookkeeping and office work since 1970, chuckles when he realizes he can´t pinpoint the year his mother, Sadie, now 94, stopped working. The mid-1980s, maybe?
"I know she worked until she was in her mid-80s," Carol Presser said of her mother-in-law´s tenaciousness. "She´d still like to come down (and work)."
Sadie Presser started coming to work back in 1956 when her husband, the late Jack Presser, was running the show — a post he was handed by his father, the company´s founder, in 1938.
As the years passed and the company´s ownership channeled through the family, Euclid Industrial Maintenance´s array of cleaning services expanded to include janitorial work, carpet cleaning, wall washing, floor maintenance, acoustic ceiling cleaning, construction cleanup, duct cleaning, walk-off mat rental service and sales, and really just about meeting any request a client makes.
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