Despite having no plans to succeed his parents, Vernon “Andy” Stevens II and his wife, Dawn, have slowly filled leadership roles at Southern Business Machines, Inc. As the family tells it, a succession plan for the business occurred naturally but wasn’t initially expected. “When I was very young, I looked at what my parents did, and I never saw that 24 years later, the job that I do is what I would be doing next,” Andy says of his parents, Vernon and Jennifer Stevens.
The couple landed in Evansville when Vernon, then working for shipping software provider Pitney Bowes, was transferred to Evansville from Lexington, Kentucky, in 1987. Two years later, he went solo and launched Southern Business Machines, Inc., a Mailing System Dealer, with 127 customers, two employees, and only a sliver of a regional market dominated by now-competitor Pitney Bowes. Thirty-six years later, SBM has diversified services to carry shredders, copiers, printers, and other paper handling equipment. Its client list sits in the thousands, and the Stevenses report that the company controls more than 65 percent of its 52-county market in Indiana, Kentucky, and Illinois.
In the beginning, Vernon worked in sales, while Jennifer’s role has remained handling administrative tasks. The key to SBM’s success, Vernon says, is “I never crossed over into her job. And she didn’t cross into mine.” Neither parent thought about a succession plan nor made any assumption that SBM would become a family business. “Andy’s summers were spent traveling the road with me. So, he was around it at a very early age,” says Jennifer, who still serves as SBM’s president. “But we really did not look 20 years down the road, 25 years down the road. … We just got into it, made it happen.”
Andy, a Reitz Memorial High School graduate, followed in his father’s footsteps when he became an account representative in May 2002 after performing deliveries for Working Distributors and Anheuser-Busch. “I was a 21-year-old kid getting to work in the beer industry. It was fun until it wasn’t. We were having a dinner conversation, and it led to, ‘Well, hey, come help.’ Then I just stayed,” Andy recalls. “It was easy for me because when the business started, my parents were building something, and I was the kid who tagged along. When I officially started, I was under my dad’s wing for eight years to learn not only the products, but the services and scope of where and how we sold things. I worked up to where I finally had my own area and went out to make sales calls and talk to customers.”
“Early on, we weren’t sure how Andy would adapt, but he’s a salesperson and he took to it very easily,” Jennifer says. “I’ve seen it since its infancy, so by the time I got to doing it on my own, I didn’t have to ask, ‘What would he say?’ or ‘What would she do?’” Andy adds.
Dawn, a William Henry Harrison High School graduate and former manager of the since-shuttered Savvi Formalwear, joined the company as a sales manager in 2008 while she and Andy were dating. They married in 2009. “The owner of Savvi actually wanted me to buy it from him. But Vernon said, ‘I’d rather you run my company,’” Dawn says.
As senior vice president alongside his wife, Andy runs daily operations, makes sales calls, oversees equipment servicing and repairs, and stays abreast of industry trends. Dawn has taken on more responsibility as general manager, overseeing company policy while managing equipment supply and customer relations. “It just happened so naturally, especially when Vernon retired and as Jennifer’s taken a little more of a step back,” she says. “Since I’ve been in the picture, there’s never been any doubt that Andy was planning to be in the role that he’s in. … It’s very rewarding to work with the people who are important to you.”
Vernon retired six years ago, and Jennifer spends most of her time working from home, solely on finances and paying bills. “Over the years, we have been accosted by several people to sell. But by that time, Andy and Dawn had already transitioned very strongly into the business, and we never even considered selling because we did assume that they would just take our places and continue with the business,” Jennifer says. “We feel very confident in their abilities. They have really stepped in and have done a good job, and they get better every day. And I step a little further away every day.”
“Andy and Dawn are a great team together,” Vernon adds. “What I had to do was let them take their ownership. It was always my plan that if they’re going to run it, I can’t be there, because people are going to come to me. And they’re going to make mistakes. I’ve made monumental ones, but never think of making mistakes as a problem. It’s a solution that you have to come up with on your own. And that’s where their strength is today. They know how to do this by themselves.”
Will Andy and Dawn’s children — Charlotte, 10, and Vernon III (known as Drew) 13 — carry Southern Business Machines, Inc. forward? They’ll make that call. “They’ve been part of the business from the time they were born,” Jennifer says. Vernon adds, “I wouldn’t put any pressure on them. But they know the availability. They’re always welcome.”
Read more about succession planning at three other businesses.
