Simple Living, Great Thinking

About seven years ago, the owner of Peak left the company and hasn’t been involved since. He is doing humanitarian and missionary work in almost 10 third world countries through a non-profit that he developed called ECHO. Chris was Amanda’s mentor for 10 years, and the skills and work ethic he taught her are priceless, genuinely priceless. “When he left the company, my team and myself were forced to ‘figure it out’. Not only did we “figure it out,” our sales skyrocketed, our culture changed, the company he left is no longer in existence. When I say this, I don’t want to make it sound as if it’s a ‘better change’ or that our way of doing things are ‘better’.”

The company now has under 40 employees, most of which live within a few-mile radius. They are the definition of a small hometown company. “Do I want our company to grow, expand and reach across the US or globally? No, it’s not who we are, I am content with providing a good life to those 40 people, we don’t need glitter and glam,” elucidates Amanda. “And that is ok! I believe you should always “work to live,” not “live to work.” Huge personal sacrifices shouldn’t be required, and if so, I believe you’re working for the wrong company.”

It didn’t take Amanda long in her role to understand the value of the employees on the floor. “They are the reason for peaks success, not me. And I have a motherly mentality of taking care of them like family, and I feel that this is a deep-rooted characteristic of a women leader. Every quarter I cook a full home cooked meal for the entire company,” she says. “We give everyone his or her birthdays off paid, and their anniversary dates, paid. We buy everyone’s boots on a yearly basis and pay for their Sams club memberships. We have stellar medical, dental, vision and so on. We have chili cook offs and pie in the face competitions. We give bags of fresh beef to all of our employees around the holidays and yummy pies at thanksgiving.” The company helps the employees when things come up, and they need food on the table. “Its who we are and this can never change. We are family, and its not for show, it’s the truth. We have an incredible employee satisfaction rating with our employees and extremely low turnover.” 

With Amanda’s blue-collar roots, supporting professional trade careers came pretty naturally. She continues to serve as the chair of the Shop Rat Foundation Board. Promoting careers in the skilled trades to the youth is extremely important to her. School tends to advance great careers from doctors and lawyers and provides students with the idea that years of schooling and debt are required for success. “I’m here to say, its ok if you don’t want some high-level career, its ok to be middle class and its ok to work with your hands! Women too; there are so many careers in manufacturing like engineering and quality control that capitalize on women’s strengths,” says the steadfast leader. Women in manufacturing or leadership roles usually have close attention to detail. Some of Peak’s absolute best employees are women. “In my role within the Shop Rat Foundation I can promote careers like this to the youth and to the young women who we need so greatly in this country. We are embarking on a skilled trades labor shortage and it is only about to get worse.” She adds, “Manufacturing is alive and well, and although Industry 4.0 is moving these careers to more of a robotic and automated specialty, we need those with a mechanical mind to grow alongside these companies.”

Along with employee satisfaction, the Peak team has to support the surrounding communities. And by that, it means charitable giving and community support. In the last several years, the company has structured a fantastic giving program that includes charity of the month programs, employee volunteering incentive programs, payroll deduction programs to help support-amazing programs like the Shop Rat Foundation! Amanda and her team heavily support professional trades education for the local youth, participating in the JAC3 program and sponsoring many other educational programs. “I feel that if you’re not supporting your surrounding community you are failing as a business owner. If you’re doing it all for profit, you’re doing it wrong. The positive effect businesses can have in their communities is astonishing.”

Peak works in a niche market, providing a component to a hub assembly for the heavy truck market. Chris Salow helped design and develop this technology with the customer years before, and now their parts are in semi-trucks worldwide. Peak is unique in its processes, but it’s thanks to the owner’s old ‘farmboy’ mentality. They utilize old rigid and timeless equipment and add automation to machine the parts in a much unconventional way. Still, it works and continues to be economical for the customers. Sometimes sticking to the old ways with a bit of ingenuity is the perfect recipe for success. 

“I say “be yourself” you will be more successful than if you try to be someone else. Some days I wear my muck boots and a hoodie to the office, some days I’m in a suit and heels. Some days I’m negotiating contracts, other days I’m cleaning the toilets,” says Amanda. “We have dogs that run around the office, we laugh and have fun, we watch hilarious movies during our lunch break, and we turn up the radio too loud and sing terribly (well I do). I am just a person, and so is every other leader out there, so have fun with it and be yourself!”