KanEquip, a dealership based in Wamego, Kan., is celebrating 50 years in business. The dealership includes 8 locations in Kansas and one in Nebraska. As part of its forward-thinking approach to business, they recently completed a $6 million renovation of its Wamego location. The dealership is also securing its future through a succession plan. 

Jim Meinhardt, co-owner of KanEquip, says that he and the original dealer principals from some of company's mergers, Jim Burke and Terry Robl, are in their 70s. “We asked ourselves, ‘What are we going to do with this monster?’ We have good young managers in place who can take this business over,” he says. The management team also includes his sons, Bryndon and Grant, and daughter, Jaimee.

“When we did the merger, we set a beginning value on our assets. We used that valuation to set up a stock ownership plan,” Meinhardt says. They have a limited number of shares and no one outside the company is an investor. If an employee who holds stock leaves the company, they have to sell their shares back to the company or to another employee.

Meinhardt says the program has worked well. “At this point, we have 3 major stockholders and the younger generation is slowly starting to invest,” he says.

Read more about KanEquip's growth strategies in this feature from the spring 2017 issue.