Case Studies Region: Midwest

John Colapinto is at a point in his life where his biggest concern could be his golf score. Indeed, the resident of south-central Pennsylvania enjoys chasing birdies as well as spending time with his family, especially his grandchildren. But there’s another family in Milwaukee that Colapinto cares deeply about. That’s the Hughes family, founders and […]

Brent Schwoerer says it would take his growing operation in Springfield, Illinois, eight years to produce what Anheuser-Busch does in one batch. So be it. As far as he’s concerned, a greater honor would be his company’s designation as a Certified B Corp., a process that was well underway when Schwoerer spoke to Terra Firma […]

Giuseppe Loffredo and his family had only been in the U.S. for a year when he founded the Loffredo Fruit and Tobacco Co. in Des Moines, Iowa, in 1892. He cultivated land to grow tomatoes and other vegetables he sold to hotels, restaurants and even U.S. Army soldiers stationed in the Midwest. It was a […]

Josh Beckett didn’t start off as the owner and chief executive officer of Anna’s House—he came in 2004 because he loved the food and the atmosphere. In 2005, a year after his first meal and not wanting the business to close, he purchased the business from Becky Miller, who was no longer interested in owning […]

Things were looking good for Rick and Cheryl Barsness in March 2020. The couple was celebrating the success of their Incredible Pizza Co., founded in 2001, and the opening of a new restaurant in Shawnee, Kansas. As Don Potvin, who’s worked with the couple since 2004, notes, these are no ordinary pizza joints. They are […]

On an otherwise quiet December Sunday in 2020, an errant spark amongst some wires and cables flared into an electrical fire that decimated CoreFX Ingredients’ headquarters in downtown Chicago—including the company’s Customer Innovation Center. Opened just three years earlier in 2017—just a little over a year after Denis Neville launched the food ingredients manufacturer—the 5,000-square-foot […]

Not everyone dreams of taking over their family business. Joan Daleo, however, is thrilled to be at the helm of the company her parents started in 1973. Since becoming president of Ole Tyme Produce in 2001, she’s grown it into the largest woman-owned, fresh food distributor in Missouri. The St. Charles-based company distributes locally grown […]

Tim Gomez will never forget his 10-day trip to Switzerland in January 2020 right before COVID-19 brought the world to a screeching halt. The Kansas entrepreneur wasn’t there to ogle at the Matterhorn or buy a cuckoo clock. Instead, Gomez toured farms in Gstadd—a place where cheesemaking has been revered for centuries—to learn more about […]

In the early days of Saucy Brew Works, Brent Zimmerman got a piece of advice he hasn’t forgotten. An equity investor told the company’s CEO and co-founder to “get internal culture right.” Zimmerman, who started the brewery with Eric Anderson, has kept this message in mind with every business decision he’s made in the five […]

If that classic cowboy song had been accurately written, generations would have grown up singing: “Oh give me a home where the bison herd roam….” For it’s bison, not buffalo, that once roamed the North American plains by the tens of millions. But Brewster M. Higley, the 19th century Kansas doctor who penned “Home on […]