Demco is a fourth-generation, family-owned business with small-town roots and strong values that continue to guide the company to this day. The business was founded by President Robert Koerselman’s grandparents 61 years ago, on their farm just outside of Boyden, Iowa, a community of just 697 people.
Prior to the founding of Dethmers Manufacturing Company (Demco), Robert Dethmers and his father owned and operated Dethmers Implement, a farm equipment dealership. Dethmers Manufacturing company was launched on this site. Still in business nearly three quarters of a century after its founding, today Demco manufactures the highest quality agriculture equipment, semi-trailers, RV towing products, and trailer components.
The company’s focus has evolved over the decades, but the family tradition continues, with Koerselman’s son, JC, currently serving as Managing Director. How has the company managed to succeed into the fourth generation, when so many other businesses fail to make that leap? One secret is that successors must earn their place. It has never been a given that the next generation would reap the benefits of the previous generation’s labor.
Robert Koerselman made sure that the fourth generation of the family explored other options first, gaining real-life experience and strengthening their work ethic. “You’re going to go out and grow your roots elsewhere and learn business,” he told them. “If the fourth generation wants to be involved, they would be given an opportunity to get involved, but only after they’ve been able to provide growth opportunity in a different industry, with a different job first.”
Then, after a new generation commits, they are treated like anyone else. “No guarantees that an opportunity to work at Demco means that you’re going to own shares,” Koerselman says. “And [being] an owner doesn’t give you any special privileges.”
Throughout Demco’s long history, the company culture has remained a critical component, uniting multiple generations. “We’re very focused on faith,” says Koerselman. “We’re a faith-based company.” This faith is reflected in the team’s ongoing commitment to the community. “We are very community minded, and so there have been a lot of projects that we get involved in, whether it’s economic development, our high schools, or trade schools.”
With community ties stretching back to the 1930s, the team is eager to maintain those connections in the future. “We’re committed to passing this on to the fourth generation, keeping it in these communities that we’re involved in, and continuing to support the communities in many different ways,” Koerselman says.
This community spirit isn’t just outward facing. “There are communities inside the building where we build teams,” says Mark Nilles, Vice President of Operations. “Every one of them knows the ownership. They know who they are; they’re involved. And that’s just a good feeling when you bring people into the company. I have my son working here. So does [Director of Sales] Benji [Vande Griend], and you wouldn’t do that if you weren’t comfortable. So that environment that we’re talking about—that community environment, that family environment—is throughout the company internally and externally.”
Demco’s diverse portfolio across a wide range of industries is another secret to success. The team pursued this diversity in order to survive a difficult time that affected the agricultural industry nationwide. “It really came out of the 1980s farm crisis, and it was at that point that we got into these various industries besides just agriculture,” Vande Griend explains.
“The diversity helps us in sales,” adds Nilles. “If one product line or market is down but another is up, that helps us keep going.”
Another advantage is that employees have an opportunity to work across a wide variety of operations. “Internally, we’ve really focused on cross-training people,” says Nilles. “So it’s helped us in that we don’t have one person stuck at one machine doing one thing all the time. We could have them building grain carts and building couplers. Our workforce is very diverse; they don’t get stuck in one area. They get to branch out, find what they love, and work in multiple areas. We have a wide variety of aspects with different challenges to keep them motivated. So it’s very good for our workforce as well.”
The company’s products break down into four broad categories: one is RV towing, which includes tow dollies, tow bars, fifth wheel hitches, tow bar baseplates, braking systems for towed vehicles, and frame bracket kits.
Another sales category covers trailer components. This includes everything from trailer couplers, trailer brake actuators, and jacks to trailer tongues, spare tire mounts, and safety cables. A lot of these products are sold directly to trailer manufacturers.
True to its roots, the company still provides a wide range of agricultural equipment made for any size of farming operation, available in a variety of sizes and models. “That’s a number of products—anything from sprayers to tractor-mounted tanks, grain carts, gravity flow wagons, header transport trailers for hauling combine heads, tip-ups and tank extensions that go on the combine to hold more grain—all products focused on the farmers—grain farmers mainly,” says Vande Griend.
The team’s expertise in agricultural grain trailers has expanded to cover the broader semi-trailer category, and these trailers have successfully moved Demco into new industries. For example, the side dump trailer has a variety of uses, “anything from hauling product out of mines to hauling gravel, sand, dirt—lots of types of products,” says Vande Griend. “Then we also have a steel drop deck trailer which, again, has various usages in various industries, from farming to construction.” Demco’s gondola trailer, another diverse product, hauls scrap, “so that puts us into the scrap industry, hauling scrap out of scrapyards.”
Demco also operates a rental side of the business, which provides trailers and dollies for well-known companies such as Penske.
The team is committed to providing the highest quality product and service to every market they serve. “It goes along with our mission statement of doing our best to provide the best,” says Koerselman. “Whether it’s designing product, building product, doing customer service, working trade shows, or being an employer, we are doing our best… We’re not suggesting that there’s perfection within Demco, but there is a high expectation to do our best and define what that best is. And so we work very hard at doing that.”
“The mindset of the company, the mindset of the ownership, is continuous improvement,” Nilles agrees. “Our best always gets better if we never stop focusing on improving, challenging ourselves every day on all processes.”
A strong focus on customer service is a critical component of this commitment. “We try to set ourselves apart, along with high-quality products, by having personable customer service,” says Nilles. “So, as an example of that, when our customers call into Demco, they get a person. They do not get a machine—they get our receptionist, and she will ask a couple of questions to make sure that we’re going to get them to the right team member that can help that customer out.”
The company is eyeing expansion as it looks to the future. “We have a strong desire to continue to grow market share,” Koerselman says. Management is always asking, ‘are we offering the right products? Are there holes in our offering within this given industry? What do we need to do to fill that gap?’”
To ensure the company can fill those gaps, “We’re investing in more engineering resources, trying to get our project timeframes shorter so that, when we do get involved in an engineering project, that time to market is shorter,” Koerselman says. “And we get very intentional with that, knowing that if we can be there quicker than our competition, then we’re ahead of our competition. And we’ve got a lot of good competitors in all of our industries.”
With such strong competition, this team will have to stay at the top of their game. But, after 61 years in business, they are more than prepared for the challenge. “Our focus is to try to be an industry leader within all of our industries,” Koerselman says. “If we can accomplish that, there’s tremendous growth for us.”
