Earnest UK Celebrates 20 Years of Business

In 2000, then-CEO John Zehnder wanted to better support VMI business that had begun growing in the late 90s. He also wanted to end his tenure as President and CEO with something memorable – expanding Earnest Machine. This year, Earnest is pleased to share its UK branch is celebrating its 20th year of business. 

“Earnest Machine needed a way to support its growing VMI business, but my father also wanted to introduce inch to a metric market and likewise metric to an inch market. That’s where opening a branch in the UK began,” said current Earnest CEO, Kirk Zehnder. “It also didn’t hurt that he picked England because they spoke English.” 

In the years since Earnest’s UK branch opened, it’s grown considerably. While new team members have been added, there are several who have been on staff for a decade as well as since its inception, which is a testament to the culture of the company. In 2014 and 2016, Earnest UK acquired two small engineering companies and merged them into one site. These acquisitions provided the ability not only to help with core products in the Earnest catalog, but with hard-to-source parts as well as specials. 

Practices and procedures in Earnest’s UK branch are not treated differently simply because the office is on a different continent. This fall the UK office will be one of the sites audited for Earnest’s Annual ISO certification. ISO certification is voluntary and Earnest continues re-certification year-over-year with no significant findings. 

While the UK office may be thousands of miles away, it maintains a strong relationship with the US with regular communication. The success of the UK office with specials has launched a campaign in the US to bring the same kind of business, which is why employees sourcing specials in Earnest’s US office report to UK Manager, Stuart Southall.

Twenty years of business does not come easy to any company. It takes a continuous commitment to embrace change in an effort to keep up with the needs of the customer. Both Earnest Machine US and UK dedicate themselves to putting the customer first in all decision making and as the UK branch celebrates its 20th year of business, they look forward to what the next decade brings in terms of change and growth as they continue to work toward getting the customer the right part, in the right quantity, on-time, everytime.