Welding boss is Finland's businessman of year

Jouko Kemppi (59), chairman of Kemppi OY, a family run business in Lahti (Southern Finland), is Finland's businessman of the year for 2005.

Jouko Kemppi (59), chairman of Kemppi OY, a family run business in Lahti (Southern Finland), is Finland's businessman of the year for 2005.

The award is made annually by the Businessman Association of Finland together with the editor in chief of Talouselama, Finland's leading financial journal.

One criterion states that the award is given to the businessman who has, for several years, run a successful company showing entrepreneurial skills.

Jouko Kemppi's philosophy is that whilst others are still thinking about what to do, he has already made decisions.

Some decisions may be mistakes but he learns every time from them.

Kemppi OY is one of Europe's leading welding equipment manufacturers with a turnover fast approaching 100m Euros.

The operation is profitable with production carried out in Finland.

Other companies have moved their production to countries with low labour costs but Kemppi has not and it said that it still continues to grow faster than the market.

This year growth is on line to be around 13 per cent and the balance sheet looks good, whilst the company is debt free.

Kemppi has 50 employees devoted to product development, which is one in every 10 employees.

The company supplies welding equipment to many international manufacturers including, Hyundai, Exxon and Mercedes Benz.

It is said that Jouko Kemppi's friends say: "You cannot study to be a Jouko Kemppi.

If you want to sell refrigerators to Eskimos he is the man to send.

When someone takes one step he takes two, he has a tremendous ability to operate at high speed, always looking at new ideas." Kemppi commented: "I have always been vivid and full of ideas, maybe even wild sometimes.

Making no decision is the worst thing I know.

I have said on many occasions that whilst I have been making decisions, I will have made a few mistakes.

Let's get things done.

I believe that many companies are avoiding decision making because they are afraid of making mistakes.

We have to earn to invest.

We are at the forefront of welding technology and we sell profitably.

It is an image matter for us that we are a Finnish family company and production is in Finland.

Since the mid-1980s business has been tough for middle-sized Finnish companies but we have been very successful.

We are amongst the very top companies in the welding industry in technology, sales and marketing." Four years ago Kemppi introduced a company slogan, 'The Joy of Welding' and this year, a product promise, 'Arc under control' has been launched on a 300 square metre stand at the Schweissen und Schneiden welding exhibition in Essen, Germany.

Jouko Kemppi believes that he has proved that good brand image also appeals to the hardest welder in industry.

Even Brazilian samba dancing girls have been bought to the stand putting fun in to the business, whilst distributors and dealers are often taken to Finland on chartered flights.

When business allows it, Jouko Kemppi participates in those trips and he will ask the stewardesses to take a break, whilst he personally serves drinks to everybody on board.

He said: "In the depression of the 1980s we faced the same difficulties as many other companies, with low demand at home and in export markets.

The Finnish currency was devalued and we made a 40m Finn Mark loss.

Equity was finished.

We made a plan to turn the company around and be profitable again.

Property was sold and we had to make redundancies, part of our production was moved to local sub-contractors.

We built up a network of sales companies both inside and outside Europe.

Today, we have sales companies in 15 countries, including the UK and Australia, which is one of our fastest growing markets.

Setting up those companies has required a lot of patience and it ties up money for around three to five years but we also control our own destiny." Kemppi added: "We want to be the BMW of the welding world.

We have always believed and invested in quality.

Even in the 1980s we had a culture of quality production with no rejects and no mistakes.

If we had a reject or made a mistake we wanted to know why.

I think that companies of our size should discuss things together.

I believe it to be more cost effective than using costly business consultants." The bottom line is used in research and development together with good sales promotion techniques, not in company acquisitions.

There is much welding done worldwide and the company's market share is small but it has excellent qualified staff to take the business forward.

The company knows the competition is hard, but it is not afraid of it, believing that it is a healthy situation, said the chairman.

Kemppi is in good condition and in good hands, CEO Annsi Rantasalo is doing an excellent job and the third generation of the family is now involved.

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