The 500

 

Since 1935, Joseph, the elder Donohoo, has been involved with more than two dozen start-ups, including several in the paper industry. And he knew that most mills have excess paper and paperboard to sell. It is those excesses that The Gibson Group agrees to broker.

So far, it has been a lean if somewhat far-flung operation. Father Joe works out of his home in Florida, while his oldest son William does his selling from his home in California. It is left to Richard, the younger son and treasurer, to oversee the company's finances and small staff from the company's headquarters on the second floor of a renovated house in a quiet Cincinnati neighborhood. There are no company trucks, no storage facilities, no fancy computer systems. Here's a company that truly gives new meaning to the term "paper entrepreneurship."

But not for long. In October, The Gibson Group purchased its own paper mill in Harriman, Tenn.

#225

INSURANCE CONSULTING ASSOCIATES INC.

PETALUMA, CALIF.

To the neighbors it seemed so sad: a house gutted and a bereaved homeowner wondering why anyone would have wanted to burn his home down. But to the investigators of Insurance Consulting Associates, it didn't look quite so mysterious. On quick inspection, it seemed as if there had been a neatly sawed hole in the first-floor ceiling. And on further investigation, it was discovered that the bereaved homeowner had, conveniently enough, rented a chain saw the very weekend fo the mysterious fire. The man was later convicted of arson and sent to prison. And Ronald Blanquie had made a loyal client of yet another insurance company.

"About 20% of all insurance claims are fraudulent," says Blanquie, "and most people who make payouts have no process to detect it." In addition to insurance companies, Blanquie's customers include a growing number of self-insurers, from local governments to businesses to physicians unwilling to pay large malpractice insurance fees.

#254

SLOTLINE GOLF

HUNTINGTON BEACH, CALIF.

It is a sign of these Republican times that golf is making a comeback. That's one reason that Slotline Golf is on our list for the fourth year running. Another is a more "foregiving" club design that, by putting extra weight in the heel and toe of the club face, helps to prevent the club head from twisting in the golfer's hand.

Before he began designing golf clubs 15 years ago, C. R. "Duke" Duclos was designing airplanes and space vehicles for McDonnell Douglas Corp. Today, sales of his "inertial" putters account for the majority of Slotline's $7 million in sales, but Duclos has high hopes for his new line of irons and woods, which has been competing head-to-head with the number-one-selling Ping line over the past year. Duclos also plans to beef up his European sales as soon as a new manufacturing, warehousing, and marketing facility is completed in -- where else? -- St. Andrews, Scotland.

#287

RPM PIZZA INC.

GULFPORT, MISS.

The way we figure it, $93.5 million in pizza sales is a lot of pizza. In terms of supplies, that adds up to about 5 million pounds of cheese and 2.5 million quarts of tomato sauce each year. End to end, the pepperoni would stretch from Gulfport to Kansas City.

RPM Pizza not only delivers a lot of pizzas, it delivers an important message about franchising -- namely, that franchisees can become their own companies of significance. With 242 stores in five states and Canada, RPM is the largest franchisee of the Domino's Pizza empire and one of the largest pizza enterprises in the country. Owner and chairman of the board Richard Mueller started with Domino's as a driver in 1967 before becoming a franchisee, a corporate vice-president, and then a franchisee again -- only this time with exclusive Domino's rights to all of Louisiana and Mississippi. Having now moved well beyond its Deep South base, RPM is building new shops at the rate of two and three a month. Will the nation soon satisfy its appetite for the Italian pies? There is no indication of it from this year's INC. 500. Also on the list: The Pizza People (#456), another Domino's franchise; and Massachusetts-based Bertucci's (#265).

#316

T/MAKER CO.

MOUNTAIN VIEW, CALIF.

Heidi Roizen finds it amusing that her company is on the list of the country's fastest growing. In a way, that's precisely what she has been trying to avoid.

It all started when her brother enlisted her help in selling his new spreadsheet program. Roizen promptly set about doing what any new M.B.A. fresh out of Stanford Business School has learned to do: spend money. As a result, despite strong sales, their new company nearly faltered.

Then last year it nearly happened again. One of T/Maker's independent software developers had come up with the first desktop publishing program for the IBM personal computer, and within the first 10 weeks, T/Maker had orders for 10,000 copies. What it didn't have was the support staff necessary to provide 24-hour-a-day support services to 10,000 customers and to make constant improvements to the program. Personal Publisher required a bigger company than Roizen or her business partner, Royal Farros, wanted to run, and they promptly sold the program to a larger firm.

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