2008 flood defining event for Hupp Electric Motors

CEDAR RAPIDS - If there was a defining event in the 100-year history of Hupp Electric Motors, it likely was the company's response to customers affected by the June 2008 flood.

With employees working 12-hour shifts in July and August 2008, the company inspected more than 4,100 electric motors and cleaned and repaired 1,472 units - triple the normal rate.

"We were moving motors through as quickly as possible," recalled Kevin Hupp, fourth-generation owner and president of Hupp Electric Motors, 275 33rd Ave. SW. "We were able to get well pump motors back to the city in 17 hours.

"We served two meals a day to our employees for six weeks. Twenty of our employees also were dealing with their homes being flooded."

Offering 24-hour service has been a standard practice for Hupp Electric Motors for many years.

"A lot of our customers run 24 hours a day, 7 days a week," Hupp said. "Having a motor go down is extremely costly for many businesses. They rely on us to get a motor back to them as quickly as possible.

"When the flood occurred in June 2008, we had a plan to handle the volume we were anticipating. We had some practice with the flood in 1993."

Founded by William "Bill" Hupp as Electric Motors Co. in 1912, the company initially specialized in wiring grain mills and elevators. The business was located at 219 First St. SW - "next to the police station" as the address was painted on the company's trucks.

When William died in 1938, his son Julian Hupp, an electrician, took over management and Electric Motors changed its focus to the sale and repair of electric motors, motor controls and power tools. The company primarily sold to industrial accounts, dealers and contractors.

By 1939, Electric Motors employed 15 and had developed a reputation in electrical contracting, trouble-shooting and installation of wiring and fixtures. The business continued to grow as it moved into the repair and rewinding of electric motors.

In 1942, Electric Motors moved to 353 Second Ave. SW as additional space was needed. As World War II came to a close, Julian Hupp began hiring what would become the nucleus of the company's work force for nearly half a century.

"In 1955, we became the first electrical contractor in our trade area to have our own in-house machine shop," Kevin Hupp said. "We changed the name of the company in 1966 to Hupp Electric Motors to make our family business more recognizable,"

MOVING TO THE COUNTRY

A devastating fire on July 30, 1968, started on the second floor where another company operated, swept through the Hupp Electric Motors building, destroying most of the company's inventory and equipment. Office employees had the presence of mind to save company records.

The Cedar Rapids School District bought the damaged building two months later and used it for storage until the 2008 flood. Electric Motors, meanwhile, leased a temporary location at 118 First St. NW shortly after the fire and bought 3 acres of land on 33rd Avenue SW for construction of a $200,000 building.

"When we bought the land on 33rd Avenue SW in 1968, that was really considered the country," Hupp said. "There were no hotels or restaurants, and Interstate 380 had not been built.

"We thought we had enough land to meet any future need for expansion."

Julian retired in 1970 and his son, Robert "Bob" Hupp, who had been active in Hupp Electric Motors for a number of years,  bought the company and became president.

"We began shifting away from the power tools business in the early 1970s when my father, Bob Hupp, looked around and saw that we needed to service larger motors," Kevin Hupp said. "It became obvious there were other opportunities for services that the industry needed.

"We began servicing cranes and hoists as well as wiring electrical control panels. We also began offering predictive maintenance, surge testing, portable balancing and core loss testing."

In 1982, Bob Hupp purchased Power-Lift Inc. in Davenport, the Toyota forklift dealer for Iowa and western Illinois. The acquisition set the stage for the company to eventually have locations in Cedar Rapids, Ankeny, Davenport, Waterloo and Peoria, Ill., to be closer to its forklift customers. (Forklifts, given their bulk, are serviced at the customers' site.)

"When  my father bought Power-Lift, he was able to envision that the Toyota forklift business would be a good addition," Kevin Hupp said.

"While Toyota was just a blip at that time, he told me that it would eventually become the No. 1 brand for forklifts. Toyota has been No. 1 in the United States and the world for 10 years running, so his prediction came true."

Under Bob Hupp's leadership, Hupp Electric Motors expanded to eight divisions. When Bob retired in 2005, Kevin Hupp  purchased the company and became president.

From a single employee when Bill Hupp started the business 100 years ago, Hupp Electric Motors has grown to 200 employees. The company's Cedar Rapids facilities have been expanded several times to accommodate growth, and Kevin Hupp envisions yet another expansion despite the fact that the company is landlocked.

"We have some ideas to give us some additional space," he said. "We need higher equipment bays to handle larger motors that we're already servicing, and we think we can do that in our current footprint.

"While I don't know what the next 100 years will bring, my goal is to continue the legacy that has been forged through these many years."