SOSSŪ Invisible Hinges

For Immediate Release

Contact
Neil Marko President Universal Industrial Products (419) 737-2324 nmarko@soss.com	Tim Trainor Trainor Communications Public Relations (313) 965-4900 TrainorComm@cs.com

Neil Marko bet the house and all the hinges in 1997 when he bought Universal Industrial Products (UIP), a company whose principal product, the Soss® Invisible Hinge, had been invented almost a century earlier by his great-grandfather. UIP was languishing under the indifferent stewardship of a distant conglomerate, and Marko was determined to buy the company and restore the family heritage.

Marko made an offer to purchase UIP and he put everything on the table, including his home, car, and savings, to secure a bank loan. "If UIP failed, I would be at the fast food place down the street recommending the happy meal," Marko said.

Based in Pioneer, Ohio, a farm village near the Michigan and Indiana borders, UIP was a division of Core Industries, a diversified industrial and electronics firm in Detroit. The 43-year-old Marko had been president of UIP since 1985, starting his career there as a salesman after graduating from college.

In addition to door and lid hinges, UIP also produced metal stampings, including lawnmower replacement blades for such mass merchandisers as Sears and Montgomery Ward.

UIP didn't fit the parent company's long-range plans, so Marko's pleas for equipment upgrades and new product development were consistently delayed or ignored. "It got to the point where we couldn't compete in our markets," Marko said. "We were being starved."

Marko was convinced that UIP could grow and prosper under independent leadership, and he also felt a strong desire to preserve a business that had been part of his family for almost a hundred years. He offered to buy UIP, and Core Industries responded by placing the operation on the market to the highest bidder.

For the next year Marko had the distasteful task of conducting tours for would-be suitors of a firm he coveted. The plot thickened when United Dominion, a Canadian conglomerate, acquired Core Industries.

"United Dominion got wind of the lack of enthusiasm in my tour techniques and made sure to have a corporate suit present whenever prospective buyers inspected the premises," Marko recalled.

Potential purchasers vanished when Montgomery Ward went bankrupt, owing UIP $430,000. The declining company had accepted several truckloads of lawnmower blades and couldn't pay for them.

This left Marko as the lone candidate, but United Dominion held firm on the asking price. Marko called on banks but was turned down flatly everywhere until Charter One in Cleveland provided the money under onerous terms, requiring a high interest rate and all his personal assets.

Marko's first move after buying UIP was to gain total control of the SOSS® Invisible Hinge operation. A United Dominion plant in Singapore produced the hinges, along with many other unrelated products, and had assigned UIP orders to the bottom of the priority list.

Tired of seeing empty shelves and hearing customers screaming for product, Marko bought the plant and replaced the management, returning the hinge operation to full family ownership.

Since then, UIP has prospered. SOSS® hinges are sold worldwide to designers and architects, and Marko has ambitious expansion plans. Among them is a new concept in door handles, called UltraLatch®, which will appear in showrooms later this year.

"Our goal is to build on our leadership in hinges, and become the world's top provider of premium door hardware," Marko said.