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Specialty Industries history
Specialty Industries company history timeline
After spending twenty years building its profitability on acquisitions, in 1983, Beatrice Foods announced it was getting out of the industrial field and would be selling more than fifty of its three hundred companies in the next several years.
That move was accelerated in 1984, when Beatrice assumed $3.5 billion in debt in its acquisition of Esmark Inc., and had to sell off assets to pay down some of that liability.
The firm incorporated Specialty Equipment Companies before the end of the year, and in January 1985, acquired Wells, Taylor, Bloomfield, World Dryer, and Market Forge from Beatrice.
In November 1986, Specialty purchased Beverage-Air from Gerlach Industries, Inc., in order to expand its offerings.
When Specialty Equipment bought Beverage-Air in 1986, the division sold its equipment primarily to soft drink bottlers, which bought coolers to put in supermarkets and convenience stores.
That amount ballooned to $37.6 million in fiscal 1991.
Both Specialty and SPE Acquisition had to seek Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in 1991.
The company underwent several major changes during 1993, including being listed on the NASDAQ exchange.
In 1994 World Dryer acquired Electric Aire™, a line of less expensive, plastic encased hand dryers, to augment its stainless steel and cast iron hand and hair dryers.
In 1995 Greenwood resigned as CEO while William Dotterweich assumed that responsibility along with his duties as president and chief operating officer.
Other innovations included the Maxi-Marketeers®, a line of curved-front vertical merchandisers introduced in 1995, and the Contour Cooler™, an eight-foot cooler in the shape of the traditional Coca-Cola bottle, for the international bottler market.
In 1996 Jeffrey Rhodenbaugh, president of Beverage-Air, was named president and chief operating officer.
In 1997, when the federal Food and Drug Administration changed its unified food codes, Beverage-Air completely redesigned its existing core product line, generating replacement equipment sales, especially to quick service restaurant chains.
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Zippia gives an in-depth look into the details of Specialty Industries, including salaries, political affiliations, employee data, and more, in order to inform job seekers about Specialty Industries. The employee data is based on information from people who have self-reported their past or current employments at Specialty Industries. The data on this page is also based on data sources collected from public and open data sources on the Internet and other locations, as well as proprietary data we licensed from other companies. Sources of data may include, but are not limited to, the BLS, company filings, estimates based on those filings, H1B filings, and other public and private datasets. While we have made attempts to ensure that the information displayed are correct, Zippia is not responsible for any errors or omissions or for the results obtained from the use of this information. None of the information on this page has been provided or approved by Specialty Industries. The data presented on this page does not represent the view of Specialty Industries and its employees or that of Zippia.
Specialty Industries may also be known as or be related to SPECIALTY INDUSTRIES OF ST JOSEPH I, Specialty Industries and Specialty Industries of St. Joseph, Inc.