Flow-Eze grows in space, products
Rockford Register Star
May 18, 1987
By Laura LeMar
Ideas for new products and services just seem to flow, one after another, at Flow-Eze Co. on Rockford's wes side.
William T. McCarren, a lifelong Rockford resident, and his wife, Alice, founded the company in 1946 at 3209 Auburn Street where it still is. The company's name come from one of William McCarren's first product lines - liquid and crystal drain openers, septic tank cleaners and root destroyers.
"We are still making the Flow-Eze brand drain cleaners and root destoryers today and have added some related products, such as glass cleaner and air freshener," said Patrick McCarren, president of Flow-Eze. Patrick McCarren took over operation of the company after his father's death in 1977.
"Back when my parents started the company, the only thing out here besides us were the cows in the pasture across the street and Ambrose's Grocery," he said.
Since then other businesses have sprung up around Flow-Eze, and the company has grown along with the neighborhood, diversifying beyond drain cleaners.
In addition to its chemical products, Flow-Eze sells containers and bottles, does custom printing and silk-screening of company logos on the containers, does packaging and sells various promotional novelties such as pens, mugs and even golf balls to companies and puts logos or slogans on them as well.
Circumstance just seemes to leas the chemical company from one thing to another, McCarren says.
"We originally got into labeling our own bottles in the late 1960s-early '70s, when the government changed the labling laws on chemical products. We had just received a large order of bottles we had labled for our company chemical products, and then discovered we could not use them. They all had to be relabled because of the change in the law, which would be very costly," McCarren said.
"So, we decided at that time to start doing our own silk-screening in-house and labled our products from then out. We could do it cheaper ourselves, and we could do as many as we needed. We did not have to have certain size order," he said. "This worked out so well for us that we started doing it for other small businesses."
Flow-Eze then started labeling many different shapes of bottles for its customers, and started labeling many different containers for a a variety of products, most being chemical or pharamaceutical products.
"We decorated medicine vials for the military that were used in Vietnam. We have also labled fuses for NASA," he said.
A brush with disaster also motivated the McCarrens to diversify.
in 1952, and again in 1972, Kent Creek near Flow-Eze facilities flooded and caused several thousands dollars in damage at Flow-Eze.
"We had almost all our cleaning products and bottles in this warehouse, and lost nearly all of it. We probably lost a quarter of a million dollars in that flood, and that nearly did us in, McCarren said of the 1972 flood.
"At one time we had all our eggs in one basket and have learned from expieriences like this that it is preferable to have a basket with a lot of different things in it in case one has a bad year," he said. "Sure it is hard keeping track of many different products, but we are making it work."
Catering to several small customers is key to company's success. "I would rather have 7,000 small customers than be dependent on one or two large ones," he said.
It was request from these smaller customers that got the company into packaging and other services.
"That is what is special about us. We can do an order of say six dozen as well as doing large orders," he said. "Some of our small-business customers wanted to know if we fill bottles with their product as well as decorated them, because they did not need large quantities right away, and it was hard to find a place that would do this in small quantities.
"So we started packaging some products as well. We deal with a lot of small inventors who have come up with their own idea for something. For example, we have a local customer who makes his own leather-care products, show polish, cleaner, etc., and we fill his bottles for him," McCarren said.
"A lot of companies will not do silk-screening, hot stamping and pad-printing in small quantities that we will. We give that professional polished look of big-name products to the little guys," he said.
Even though Flow-Eze does a lot of work for local small-business clients, they also have national markets.
"We are a national company. Our major market is chemical products and bottles and trigger sprayers is the mantenance field. We have 20 representatives firms handling our line of products. We have a WATS line for nationwide orders. We have about 7,000 mostly small distributors that buy form us," McCarren said.
McCarren has expanded the business into another building next door to the original plant, giving him about 25,000 square feet of extra space. Flow-Eze currently has 12 full-time employees, and last year had several million in sales, he said.
The company keeps coming up with new products, too. The most recent is a metal shelf made here. The shelf is designed primarily for hospitals to hold large bottles and containers.
"Our sales have been expanded going up steadily during the past five years. My next goal is to complete a 2,000-square-foot showroom here where customers can come in and look over the various products. If we get that done, we should be set as far as space for a while anyway," he said.
Lack of space and the absence of a nearby bottle manufacturer nearly drove McCarren and Flow-Eze out of Rockford a year ago.
"We were looking to relocate in Kansas City or Atlanta. Since we had inveseted in this bottle decorating venture, and it had become a significant portion of our business, we thought we should be nested near a bottle manufacturer," he said.
"We were running out of space, and there are no major bottle manufacturers near Rockford, and it did not make sense to relcoate hear. We were and still are having bottles shipped in from accross the country," McCarren said.
"Being a family business that had been here for decades, that was a hard decision to make," he said.
McCarren was all set out to move Flow-Eze when Maor John McNamara came out for a plant tour.
"He (the mayor) asked if there was anything the city could do to make us stay, and to make a long story short, he persuaded us to stay. We then solved our immediate space problems by buying this building next the original location," McCarren said.
McCarren hedges a little when asked if he thinks the company will stay in Rockford for the long-term.
"I wish I could say that definelty, but who know what will happen. If we have the space here to keep up with growth, then we probably will," he said.
McCarren said if the company stays in Rockford, if will probably stay on the west side.
"It's simple - we have always been here, and survived and grown here," he says.
