THE JOURNAL RECORDTuesday, May 7, 2013 www.journalrecord.com Vol. 118, No. 90 • Two Sections

FAMILY-OWNED BUSINESSES

Family roofing company’s move puts it on topBY DAVID PAGE

THE JOURNAL RECORD

OKLAHOMA CITY – In 2009, SaratogaRoofing and Construction made somechanges.

That was the year the company,started in 1999, moved its headquartersfrom Fort Worth, Texas, to OklahomaCity.

“We picked Oklahoma City becauseit was growing and has low unemploy-ment,” said Chris Green, CEO.

Saratoga Roofing also adjusted itsbusiness strategy.

“We decided to get out of residentialroofing and go into commercial roofing,”said Denver Green, Saratoga Roofingpresident and son of Chris Green.

Those decisions in 2009 haveworked out well for the family business.The company that had fewer than 10employees when it moved its headquar-ters to Oklahoma City expects to exceed300 employees this month, DenverGreen said.

Saratoga operates in 23 states and inSeptember was ranked 50th on Inc.magazine’s annual 500/5,000 list of thenation’s fastest-growing private compa-nies. Revenue in 2012 totaled $30 mil-lion. Saratoga was ranked second on theGreater Oklahoma City Chamber’s 2013Metro 50 list, which included the 50fastest-growing private companies incentral Oklahoma.

“The commercial industry is verycompetitive, but with our years of serv-ice, work history, and the integrity ourteam puts into each job, we feel movinginto the commercial industry was theright move for us,” said Denver Green.

As CEO, Chris Green handles thefinancial and business side. DenverGreen handles operations.

Saratoga’s headquarters is at 209NW 132nd St. in Oklahoma City. Thecompany has smaller service-orientedoffices around the country, includingTulsa, Dallas, Charlotte and Asheville,N.C., and Jacksonville, Fla.

Locations of service offices dependon client needs, Denver Green said.

Customers include operators of gov-ernment, industrial, health, retail andschool facilities, he said. Clients includeTarget, Wal-Mart and John Q. Ham -mons Hotels & Resorts.

Saratoga did repairs to the WarrenTheatre in Moore after it was damagedby the tornado in May. The company isalso the roofing contractor for the newhospital in Joplin, Mo., being built to

replace St. John’s Mercy RegionalMedical Center, destroyed by a tornadoin May 2011. The new hospital isexpected to open in 2015.

Family involvement with SaratogaRoofing and Construction extendsbeyond Denver and Chris Green;Denver’s two brothers and wife areactive in the company. Danny Green,Chris Green’s husband and father ofDenver and his brothers, is indirectlyinvolved with Saratoga Roofing.

“He has gotten a pilot’s license andhelps fly people around to different jobsites,” Chris Green said.

By profession, Danny Green is an

auctioneer for horse sales.Chris Green’s family has been

involved in the roofing business sincethe mid-1930s with her grandfather.

“He worked nights in San Diego asan MP and days in roofing,” she said.

Her grandfather later moved toWashington state and established a fam-ily business.

“In the 1940s he got into paving roadsand highway construction,” she said.

It was a family business where theentire family was expected to do theirpart, she said. The business was sold themid-1980s.

“I grew up in the construction busi-

ness,” Chris Green said. “We also had ahorse ranch. We got back into the con-struction and real estate business in1999 when this company was started.”

It is the family horse connection thatresulted in the naming of SaratogaRoofing and Construction. The compa-ny is named after Saratoga Race Coursein Saratoga, N.Y., Chris Green said.

Saratoga’s office has a friendly, fami-ly feel. Chris Green’s office has a dogbed for her German shepherd, whichwalks with her from office to office andoften greets visitors.

“He goes everywhere I go,” ChrisGreen said of her dog.

The family connection extends toemployee family members.

“We have some employees with chil-dren who have worked here during thesummer,” Chris Green said.

Denver Green, who has two youngsons, said he envisions his childrenbeing involved with the business.

Another generation is already get-ting involved with the family business.

“My 6-year-old grandson will sweepout the warehouse when he wants somemoney,” Chris Green said.

Denver Green Chris Green

“

”

We picked Oklahoma City because it was growing and has low unemployment.

- Chris Green,CEO, Saratoga Roofing and Construction

FAMILY BUSINESSES

Taylor Kleinpeter and her dad, Jeff Kleinpeter, laugh while leaving a group of cows at theKleinpeter Farms Dairy in Montpelier, La. As Kleinpeter Farms Dairy celebrates its 100th an-niversary, the fifth generation of Kleinpeters is entering the family business, from the dairybarn up. AP PHOTO/THE ADVOCATE, ARTHUR D. LAUCK

5th-generation Kleinpeterlearning dairy business

BY TIMOTHY BOONETHE ADVOCATE

MONTPELIER, La. (AP) – As Klein-peter Farms Dairy celebrates its 100thanniversary, the fifth generation ofKleinpeters is entering the family busi-ness, from the dairy barn up.

Taylor Kleinpeter, the daughter ofKleinpeter Farms President Jeff Klein-peter and the great-great-granddaugh-ter of Sebastian Louis “Sib” Kleinpeter,who co-founded the dairy in 1913, spentAugust at a 1,600-acre dairy farm inrural St. Helena Parish. This is the firststep in an intensive training processthat will prepare Taylor Kleinpeter toeventually take a leadership role withthe dairy.

“This is no cakewalk to say theleast,” Kleinpeter said, sitting back inan office at the farm, wearing an over-sized pair of rubber boots. “I’ve hadfun, but I have started at the bottom.”

Kleinpeter, 24, graduated fromSoutheastern Louisiana University inMay with a bachelor’s degree in mar-keting. Then she went to work as an as-sistant herdsperson – Kleinpeter jokesthat she broke the glass ceiling for theherdsman’s job – and showing up asearly as 6 a.m. to tend to the 1,200-pluscows that live on the farm.

“I’m around cows all day long andmy main priority is to take care ofthem,” Kleinpeter said.

That includes helping feed and milkcows and moving pregnant animals outof the herd so they can give birth inspecial pens.

Jeff Kleinpeter said the companydeveloped a special executive pathwayfor family members who want to enterthe business. Taylor is the second per-son to go through the program. Thefirst was her cousin Stanford Ponson,

who decided to go back to school to geta combination MBA and law degreeafter about five years with Kleinpeter.

“This is a special deal, with Taylorbeing my daughter,” Jeff Kleinpetersaid. “She’s committed to staying withus, and I want her to see all of the busi-ness. She is the one.”

When Jeff Kleinpeter started work-ing for the dairy in the late 1980s, hesaid it was a “sink or swim” situation.Jeff Kleinpeter was told his uncle Vin-cent “Bobo” Kleinpeter was retiringand that he needed to learn how to dohis job.

“I want her to learn what happensin every aspect of the operation,” JeffKleinpeter said. “We started out at thefarm when we were kids, driving trac-tors, milking cows, but we were neverpulled to the side and told ‘This is whatwe mix to feed the cows.’ We never gotthe exposure to many things in the op-eration.”

Kleinpeter said he doesn’t meanthat the way he was prepared for thefamily business was better or worsethan what he is doing for his daughter,but that it was different.

And Kleinpeter Farms is in businesstoday because of family members step-ping up to handle responsibilities at anearly age. Jeff Kleinpeter said his un-cles Mike and Vincent were drivingmilk trucks at the age of 12 and 13 be-cause their three older brothers andmany other dairy employees were serv-ing in World War II.

“They would wake up at 3 a.m. toget everything ready. And they wouldserve customers on the way to school,”he said. “At recess, they would go out tothe truck to make sure the ice was onthe milk because they didn’t have re-frigerated trucks back then.”

Drew Mendoza, managing principal

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