Page 132 - Peterson 85 Years and Going Strong

CORE VALUE: INTEGRITY
Had we waited for a settlement or the judge to review all the documents of the bankruptcy, our units would have been locked up for six months.
– John Krummen, executive vice president & general manager, Peterson Power Systems
Two other petitioners were present on the conference phone call along with Tigris. Cummins was one of them. Each had equipment locked up in the bankruptcy. Each wanted their money and equipment back. Now.
According to Gene Hamilton, Peterson Power’s general sales manager, “John’s finest hour is in a crisis. That’s when he kicks into high gear. When everyone else was demanding their money back, John took a different tactic that was very innovative. And since we hadn’t paid Koontz-Wagner any money yet, we weren’t giving up anything.”
While Krummen and his attorney were in court, a team from Peterson and Johnson Thermal Systems ( JTS)8 was lined up outside the gate of the bankrupt facility. “Ten minutes after the court documents were signed, the gate opened and we went in with our trucks and started loading up,” says Hamilton. “With the assistance of Johnson Thermal, we took everything out and moved it across town to their
Enclosures under construction at JTS facility
facility.”
Don Whitehead (sales operations manager) and Bob Tanzer (account salesman) spearheaded the move down to JTS. “Peterson was able to get all of our work-in-progress released from the K-W yard on July 19, 2018, six days after they declared bankruptcy,” says Whitehead. “We got all of our engines and equipment out of Koontz-Wagner in three days. It was literally sunup to sundown, all hands on deck.”
Ironically, JTS had sold their business to Koontz-Wagner six years earlier and was just two days away from their non-compete agreement expiring when
K-W went bankrupt. JTS had already built shop facilities across town and hired people in preparation to start up again. “We brought in Peterson techs from Oregon and worked in collaboration with Johnson Thermal’s small workforce,” says Hamilton, “along with some of the people they hired from the bankrupt company. We had three weeks left to get the first unit out the door.”
Krummen wasn’t done yet either. Since Johnson Thermal Systems wasn’t on Tigris’ approved vendor list, there was some real skepticism to overcome. “I was on a call with ten people—including six lawyers—three times a day, for at least six weeks,” says Krummen. “They wanted a progress report basically every four hours. They didn’t know JTS and weren’t convinced that they could come through on time.” Instead, Tigris chose anoth- er company from their approved list—a packager in Florida—and wanted Peterson to ship the units there.
8 Johnson Thermal Systems is one of Peterson’s main packagers, also located in Caldwell, Idaho.
130 | PETERSON: 85 YEARS AND GOING STRONG