COOK- If all goes well at a July 8 county permit hearing, the former St. Louis County Public Works garage in Linden Grove will become the eventual home of a new business turning out custom countertops, and a homecoming of sorts for a Cook native son.
Darrel Kaml is a 1985 Cook High School graduate and his father, Frank, still lives in Cook. He also has a couple of brothers who live nearby. And while life long ago led him to California’s Central Valley and a successful business career in the custom tile and construction industry, he’s had an eye on finding his way back to the area for several years. Buying the former county garage building provides an opportunity to take a big step in that direction.
“The main reason for doing it there is coming home,” Kaml said. “I’ve actually been looking at it for some time thinking I can make it work, and I can’t plan anything else until I have a facility.”
County commissioners approved Kaml’s offer of $297,000 for the property at their June 6 meeting, contingent on conditional use permits being granted for a custom countertop fabrication shop as well as storage and maintenance uses.
Three utility shop buildings totaling approximately 15,000 square feet and a separate 7,200-square-foot Morton post-on-ground warehouse building would give Kaml more room than he anticipates needing for his countertop operation, he said, so he plans to offer some of that space for storage and use by other businesses.
“I’ve talked to several people and I’m going to rent out probably half of it,” Kaml said.
Central to the success of Kaml’s proposed business is the word custom.
“I’ve been doing this for 35 years and it’s always been custom installation,” Kaml said. “Up there [northern Minnesota] in that part of the country, the people who are doing construction want the best. If I’m going to be doing that kind of stuff there, I want it to be custom. So, with that, it requires good machinery, quality guys, and I’d like to expand on that and train more people in the industry.”
If all goes according to plan, Kaml could take ownership of the property by mid-August, but there’s much left to do before custom countertops come rolling out the doors.
“I’m going to set aside a year of planning and setting this stuff and do an analysis of what the need is to bring in the right machinery,” Kaml said. “I want to be sure we’re doing everything safe. Safety is the number one concern for me.”
And while Kaml doesn’t yet know how many employees he might need, when the time comes to hire he’ll be looking for people with the same solid work ethic he learned working at another local company, Hill Wood Products.
“I worked for a couple of years at Hill Wood Products,” Kaml said. “Dad retired from there. He told all of his children, ‘You can do whatever you want, but every one of you are going to work at Hill Wood Products and you’re going to learn how to work. They worked hard.”
Kaml said most of his California employees have been with him for 25 to 30 years, and he expects to draw on their expertise when training new staff.
“I apprenticed for four years before making a business out of it; I learned the trade right,” Kaml said. “I want to use those guys to train other people to treat it like it’s a real trade. I’ve really been a promoter of treating construction like a real trade.”
And when it comes to the new fabrication equipment he will need for the facility, Kaml said he plans to stick with the company here in Minnesota that’s furnished all the equipment for his California operation, St. Cloud-based Park Industries.
Good timing
Several factors have come together to make this the right time to pursue this opportunity, Kaml said.
While the economy in general was hit hard by the COVID-19 pandemic, construction was one sector that kept on booming, Kaml said. With more and more people choosing to work from their homes, they’re willing to invest in making those homes more livable, he said. He anticipates that trend will continue, while acknowledging that there’s no crystal ball to predict the industry’s future.
“It’s construction – anything can change at any time, and you’ve got to look at it from that angle,” Kaml said.
Kaml’s company in Modesto, Calif., Specialty Tile, is thriving, he said, providing a secure financial base that will allow his new venture to get established and build its niche in the local marketplace. And with connections across the country, countertops produced at the Linden Grove facility could make their way into other markets, Kaml said.
“That’s why I’m not going to shut down my business in California,” Kaml said. “That particular business has always done well. I hope that will help this one get going. It does seem like there’s enough need to make it successful. I hope it is, just for the community.”
The timing was good, too, for Kaml and his wife to buy a cabin on Susan Lake that suits Kaml’s desire for a little more isolation than a place on Lake Vermilion. The couple recently made the drive from California to spend three weeks in their new cabin.
“I used to fish Susan Lake as a kid,” Kaml said. “We were just so happy with that purchase. We haven’t been back in the summer in a long time and that place was absolutely beautiful. I’m definitely going to work myself back there. It’s going to take me a bit, but I’m going to get back there.”
The St. Louis County Planning Commission will consider Kaml’s conditional use application at 9 a.m. on Thursday, July 8 in a meeting at the Government Services Center in Virginia. For information about making public comments or participating in the meeting online, contact Jenny Bourbonais, St. Louis County Land Use Manager, at bourbonaisj@stlouiscountymn.gov.