#ThrowbackThursday – One Very Long Journey To Indiana (2012)

This week Mike Wooster, our Operations Manager at Mid-States Utility Trailer Sales and Keizer Refrigeration in Sioux City, recalls one very long journey that changed his outlook on his job. In 2012, he and Jim Keizer, the founder of Keizer companies and the late father of today’s owners Shane Keizer and Stacy Bricker, set off for a road trip to Florence, IN, for a Utility Aftermarket International Dealer Meeting. The journey would take 16 hours each way and Mike says that, in all honesty, he was not looking forward to it.

Mike got to sit next to Jim Keizer all the way and Jim spoke about his family and the company and how it all started back in the 1970s with nothing but a pickup truck and a toolbox, and how the company expanded over the years. Mike would listen and listen and soak up all the knowledge and even though today he can’t quite remember one particular conversation from the journey, he still remembers how mind-changing it was to listen to Jim for all that time, and how he became dedicated to the Keizer companies more than ever.

Mike joined the company in 2001. He had just graduated from high school and his neighbor, a current Mid-States Utility Trailer Sales employee, asked him if he was interested in a summer job for the company, to “come in a clean up the shop”. Today, 18 years later, Mike is our Operations Manager, and an inspirational leader himself who is highly respected by everyone in the company. He says that he learned a lot from Jim Keizer in his early days with the company and now he continues his learning journey with today’s company owners Shane and Stacy who are as dedicated to the family business and their employees’ welfare as their late father was.

Mike shared his “One Very Long Journey To Indiana” story with his fellow classmates at the “Skills For Success” Dale Carnegie training course this week and earned a Break Through Award for it. Congratulations, Mike, what an awesome story and a great achievement!