MiMM: Give us a brief history of Arrow Uniform.
TA: Arrow was established in 1937 as an industrial laundering facility in SE Michigan. Thomas G. Andris started his own similar business in 1949 and grew rapidly, including the purchase of Arrow in 1968, until his passing in 1974. Thomas R. and Robert Andris, who grew up in the business and followed and continued rapid expansion throughout the Midwest by internal growth and numerous acquisitions. Currently, Arrow is the eighth largest textile leasing and direct sales company in the industry with two state of the art mega plants and 15 branch distribution centers. John Caputo, Tom R’s son in law is now president and along with Fred, Tom G. and Marc 3rd generation department heads are doing very well. We expect the 4th generation to be involved in the next 10-20 years.

MIMM: How has your industry changed since 1937?
TA: In the 20’s the industry was just getting started by cleaning overalls and shop rags that led to renting other textiles like shirts and pants and entrance mats. It was extremely competitive with strong retaliation if one company took another companies business. For example, in 1951 our small laundry was fire bombed. Also, a 5 month teamster strike happened in 1971. Fortunately, that was the only strike in our history which resulted in a fire at an Arrow employee's home who was servicing customers. We got through those rough and nasty times and for many years now our company and our industry are very professional. Products in services grew extensively to its current line of not only uniform rental and sales but also hospitality sales, and health and safety.

MiMM: How does Arrow maintain its values of integrity, commitment and fiscal responsibility during these tough times?
TA: Maintaining integrity is easy. A person and a company either have integrity or they don’t. Even during hard times this is a non negotiable value. Commitment actually gets easier during hard times because it is more important to focus on doing well. Fiscal responsibility is the most challenging of the three because it is far more difficult to provide the profits needed to invest in our people and our facilities. We try to make sure that we don’t make changes that will help in the short run but we have sometimes failed in this value. We have decided to never go public because outside investors would often clash with out values.

MiMM: Arrow Uniform only services large customers, right?
TA: The opposite is more correct. Of our 17000 customers only about 20 are what we consider to be large accounts. Our average customer volume is just $49 a week.

MiMM: How should Arrow be remembered?
TA: We are passionate about giving out customers excellent service which is centered on our outstanding professional employees, state of the art facilities and treating customers like we would like to be treated. Our goal has never been to maximize profits.

Tom Andris is the CEO and second generation owner of Arrow Uniform. Arrow Uniform is a full service uniform and brand merchandising company located in Taylor, MI. Visit them on the web at www.arrowuniform.com