It’s not unusual for people to get a phone call out of the blue from someone who says he has a business proposition for them. It is unusual when those phone calls turn out to be a pretty good deal.
David Munschauer got that call in 1998. He was a veteran of the Buffalo, N.Y. industrial scene for the previous 20 years after being laid off as a teacher in 1978. He spent more than a decade working for Niagara Machine and Tool Works, a company founded by his great-grandfather; a shorter stint working for a metal plating house; and then several years as part owner of a manufacturer’s representative business. Over the years Munschauer had done business with one of the owners of SEH Metal Fabricators, who started as an irate customer two weeks into his job at Niagara and ended up being one of the companies that Munschauer later represented at his agency. This fabricating shop owner was the person that made the call to Munschauer.
“He called me up one day and said he wanted to sell the business,” Munschauer recalled. “I said that’s interesting and congratulated him. Then he said, ‘I’m going to sell it to you.’”
Author: Dan Davis
Source: The Fabricator