Little Big Company

The fastest growing business in America resides in a Green Acres setting and is run by a couple of non-college-educated brothers whose biggest dream is to keep things small.

Inc 500 Number One Company

In high school the Mendiburu brothers didn't seem destined for riches and glory.

Mike had a reputation as a party animal. Younger brother Tom was voted "class flirt." Classmates snickered at the Mendiburus' decision to skip college. "We didn't have a lot of direction," says Mike. The first years after graduation yielded little evidence that the brothers were taking life more seriously. When Mike showed up for his 10-year reunion, he was struggling to support a wife and two kids after racking up $20,000 in credit-card debt.

That was in 1996.

Today Mike and Tom are the owners of High Point Solutions, the fastest-growing private company in America. Going from $200,000 in sales in 1996 to $60 million in 2000, High Point amassed 29,902% growth in five years. No one who knew the Mendiburus back at High Point Regional High School, in Wantage, N.J., is laughing now. In fact, several classmates have joined the company in rural Sparta, N.J., just a few towns over from the brothers' birthplace. "I wasn't surprised by the level of profits," says Jeffrey Bolson, a partner in Ernst & Young's national tax group, who has advised the Mendiburus. "Shocked is more like it."

High Point's climb to the top is particularly striking when you consider the business: selling hardware for computer networks. Think Cisco routers and Lucent servers. "We're far from glamorous," says Tom, who is director of sales. "It's a strange story, almost unbelievable," says Mike, the company's CEO and technical leader, who is 50-50 owner with Tom. "My brother and I have to pinch ourselves all the time."

Certainly, there is something dreamlike about a high-tech company that's so laid-back that many of its 19 employees cut out for the fishing hole or bowling alley at lunch. Others join the owners for a game of tennis or horseshoes. Few work past 6 p.m. The corporate credo: family first, company second. Sandra Curran, whose résumé includes stints at Ernst & Young and Marriott, chucked a four-hour commute to become High Point's chief financial officer in 1998. "There's no traffic coming in, and I see the groundhogs every day," she says.

Maybe there's something in that country air. Sales per employee at High Point average a staggering $3 million. "That's about 10 times what's normal in this industry," says the CEO of another network-equipment reseller. Says Tom, "I think we can bang out $100 million with the same people, to tell you the truth." Such a lofty projection in the midst of an uncertain economy just makes the story even more surprising.

Much about the Mendiburus defies expectations. Unlike the typical Inc 500 CEO, Mike never aspired to be an entrepreneur. And while many fast-growth-company builders have pursued advanced degrees and outside expert advisers, the Mendiburu brothers claim to be entirely self-taught. Tom has never cracked a sales book and rejects popular sales gurus as "cheesy." Pressed to name a mentor, Mike offers only one: God.

And few company founders come from such meager beginnings. Growing up in tiny Wantage, the brothers wanted for practically everything. Mike remembers getting his first job at 13 to buy his own school clothes. Now the 33-year-old CEO owns a 220-acre spread in Wantage, complete with two lakes and a working farm. Tom, who is 30 and doesn't believe in debt, paid for his stately house in cash and arrived at his own 10-year high school reunion behind the wheel of a Ferrari. Who says you can't go home again?

In fact, homegrown precisely describes High Point. When Mike launched the company, in July 1996, he wanted to keep it small and in his own house; he hesitated to take on even his own brother. The elder Mendiburu's caution was born of experience: eight years spent toiling for two networking-equipment companies had seriously soured his outlook. During those years Mike had repeatedly encountered back-stabbing employees and unethical managers, and twice was betrayed by close friends who had promised him equity in start-up ventures. In the end, all he got for his efforts was a pile of credit-card debt.

It was at the lowest point in his life ("My wife and I got on our knees and asked God what to do," Mike says) that he decided to start High Point. Leaving a job in Minnesota, Mike headed for home. He closed his first sale at a rest stop in Ohio.

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