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Article Excerpt
A LONG, LONG TIME AGO--when Canadians called Victoria their queen and the Grand Trunk Railway had not yet reached Toronto--two brothers started a wholesale hardware business in that frontier town: M & L Samuel.
Careful management and solid investing by their descendants, aided enormously by able and visionary managers and a knowledgeable workforce, have brought Samuel, Son & Co., Limited to annual revenues expected to approach $3.5 billion in 2005.
To put that in perspective, Canadian Business magazine's listing of the top 50 Canadian public companies included firms grossing just over $5 billion. Thus Samuel, Son is one of the largest industrial companies in Canada, and No. 5 on this year's MCN Service Center Top 50. Samuel, Son is also one of the fastest growing companies in the industry, progressing from $1 billion in sales in 1994, to $2 billion in 1998, to over $3 billion this year.
The past
The beginning was modest, however. Mark and Lewis Samuel established M & L Samuel as a commission and wholesale metal and hardware supplier, in both Toronto and Liverpool, England, around 1855.
In 1880, Alfred Benjamin joined as a partner, and the company became M & L Samuel, Benjamin & Co. By the turn of the 20th century, Lewis Samuel's son, Sigmund, became president. Soon after, the company exited the "shelf" hardware business and focused on metals and heavy hardware. By 1912, Sigmund was a 50 percent partner. In 1929 the company relocated to new facilities in Toronto.
When Alfred's successor, Frank Benjamin, retired in 1931, Sigmund became sole proprietor and changed the company's name to Samuel. In 1960, the company moved to its current headquarters in Mississauga. When Sigmund died, his daughter, Florence Marsh, took over until 1962, when Sigmund's grandson, Ernest Samuel, became president.
Under Ernest Samuel's leadership, the company opened and acquired facilities throughout Canada and the United States. In 1985, three of the company's manufacturing divisions were combined to create a new company--Samuel Manu-Tech Inc.--which was taken public on the Toronto Stock Exchange. Samuel, Son retains a 72 percent stake in Manu-Tech.
Ernest Samuel led the company for 38 years, raising it...
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