Story republished from Winnipeg Free Press (October, 2012)
Family that Sprays Together, Stays Together.
The staff of Red River Spray-On Ltd. is a tight-knit group born out of necessity on business and personal levels. The spray foam insulation company got its start as a business run by the Oak Bluff Hutterite Colony near Morris MB, in the late 1970s.
When it became apparent the company would grow better as its own entity off the colony, founder John Maendel made the rare move in January of this year to purchase the business and leave the colony with his wife and two of their five children. "Because we were always on the road there wasn't that oversight by the leadership of the colony, which isn't conducive to the Hutterite way," says eldest son Stan Maendel, who's a project manager. "The consensus was reached that the best way to ensure an ongoing future for the company is to give full control to the ones running it for the past 35 years."
John is the chief executive officer and wife Mary helps in the office. Youngest son Aaron, is also a project manager and in charge of safety. Middle son Daniel also works for the company and is also a math, science and physical education substitute teacher during the winter months. An aunt is the company's bookkeeper.
Stan credits his father's vision and dedication, and the family's strong Christian faith, for the company's success.
John was a builder and carpenter on the colony. When he was working on its community kitchen in 1978, one of his brothers suggested he try a relatively new spray foam product to insulate the walk in freezers. John went to the States to buy the equipment, learned how to use it and has never looked back. "He's the No. 1 reason we all are who we are," Stan says. "The business is what is keeping the family very close-knit. I have no idea where we would be if he hadn't done that 35 years ago. "We were really young teenagers and he made us work in the company for our summer holidays and we all hated it, but we had no choice. And it's because he literally forced us in a direction that we're all successful now."
The company serves commercial, industrial and residential customers across Manitoba, and has even done projects as far west as Edmonton and east to Thunder Bay.
Stan started working for the company in 1991, but left the colony in 2002 and ended up taking website design at Red River College.
"Then the colony hired me back, which they generally don't do, but because I knew a lot about the business and my dad pushed it that he needed me, they hired me back to work for him." Calling himself the "enforcer of high standards," Stan says his father taught his children to focus on customer service and not put money ahead of doing good work.
"We've done projects at a loss simply because we ran into situations where doing the project the right way would require more material and we ended up not even making any money on the project, but it was done right," he says.
