Appropriate Song Lyrics
(one would think these artists were in the Hamblen Gage ESOP)
"You have to be trusted by the people that you lie to,
So that when they turn their backs on you,
You'll get the chance to put the knife in."
-----------------------------from the song Dogs by Pink Floyd
-----------------------------from their 1977 album Animals
"Ain't it hard when you discover that he really wasn't where it's at
After he took from you everything he could steal"
-----------------------------from the song Like A Rolling Stone by Bob Dylan
-----------------------------from his 1965 album Highway 61 Revisited
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The Following Is A Collection Of Some Of The Better Stories Submitted By Our Readers
Not all business owners are Tom Hamblen:
Bob's Red Mill Gives 100% Ownership To Employees
Unlike Tom Hamblen He Is Not Including Himself Or His Family
So there is another honest business owner giving his employees his company. Bob Moore, owner of Bob's Red Mill Natural Foods, is giving his 200 employees the company through an ESOP. The company has annual revenue between $30 to $50 million. The big difference between the honest Bob Moore and the scoundrel Tom Hamblen is that Bob Moore is not including himself, or any of his family members, in the ESOP. The company is going to the employees 100%. And that is exactly what Tom Hamblen promised his employees, only to become just another broken promise lie. Honorable men like Mr. Moore place a value on honesty.
Well Done Bob Moore! You are a true man of honor and integrity and the true opposite of Tom Hamblen.
AIT Labs Hands Ownership To Employees
Another Example Of An Honest Owner vs. A Greedy Egotistical Liar
The founder, president and chief executive of AIT Laboratories has transferred ownership of the Indianapolis-based company to its
employees through an Employee Stock Ownership Plan, the company announced today. AIT, an independent reference laboratory that specializes
in pain management, forensics, clinical and drug testing, has more than 320 employees nationwide. “Our employees are our biggest asset and
they have earned the right to own the company that they work so hard for every day,” CEO Michael A. Evans said in a statement. The
Southwestside company recently shared $2 million in profit-sharing bonuses with employees. (Indianapolis Star, 7/1/2009)
Congratulations to Mr. Evans and thank you for
being a man of integrity. Integrity is a foreign concept to Tom Hamblen. And that is a shame for his employees, who are the victims of his
selfish con game.
The Honest Businessman vs. The Unscrupulous Owner
I am sure you are all aware of the ESOP instituted at Wood-Mizer Corporation around the same time the ESOP was started at Hamblen
Gage from recent Indianapolis Star newspaper articles. Wood-Mizer founder Don Laskowski began his company ESOP with the intention
of giving ownership of the company to the employees, which is the same promise Tom Hamblen made to his employees. Mr. Laskowski set a
value for his company of approximately 30 million dollars as the price the employees would pay for the company through the ESOP. Less
than ten years later Mr. Laskowski completed the sale of Wood-Mizer to his employees through the ESOP. The difference between the
honorable Don Laskowski and the greedy schemer Tom Hamblen: Don Laskowski turned down an offer of nearly 60 million dollars for his
company in favor of keeping his ESOP promise to his employees, even though keeping his word cost he and his family nearly 30 million
dollars. On the other hand, Tom Hamblen, without apology, abandoned his promises to his employees and willingly accepted a ludicrous
low-ball offer for Hamblen Gage to beat the IRS deadline for the revised owner-friendly loophole closing ESOP regulations to take
effect merely to minimize his personal tax burden. Tom Hamblen never had any intention of keeping his promises, nor was the fate
of his loyal employees ever factored into any of his self-serving decisions. Tom Hamblen is all about greed. Honesty, loyalty, and
being a man of his word are not qualities he adheres to if they interfere with his pocketbook.
The Garbage Wagon
We were in the first day of a weeklong run-off of an assembly line we had built for a Continental Teves brake plant in Asheville,
North Carolina. (Run-off is the common shop term for demonstrating the functionality of a project to a customer prior to shipping.)
There were six of the customer's engineers and technicians present who were all planning to be at the Hamblen Gage facility for the
week. It was the first day, we were just getting started, and it was nearing lunchtime. Normally we would order something for delivery
like pizzas or Subway sandwiches. However being the first day and wanting to make a good impression the vice-president told me I should
take them all out for a decent lunch. He also told me to take Tom Hamblen's company vehicle, a Starcraft luxury conversion van, so we
could all ride together. I went to Tom Hamblen's office to get the keys. As he started to hand them to me a queer look suddenly came
over his face and he jerked his hand back and said, "I'll be back in a minute," and he left. He came out into the shop area a few
minutes later where we were waiting and handed me the keys. The Teves entourage and I then made our way to the exit and headed to Tom's
company van. It was a hot muggy summer day so it did not seem odd when we got to the van that Tom had left the windows open. We opened
the doors and climbed inside. Then it hit us, the pungent sweet smell of sweltering garbage. It was an awful trip to and from the
restaurant and I'm sure an impression was made, maybe not the impression the vice-president had in mind, but we left an impression.
You have to understand that it costs a couple hundred dollars a year for curb-side trash pickup at your home and Tom Hamblen was not
about to pay to have his garbage picked up, not when his company, only twenty-five miles away, rents a dumpster. Tom Hamblen has always
loaded his garbage into his vehicles and brought it to work with him. Normally he would stop at the dumpster on his way to park his
vehicle, but on this day he forgot, at least until I asked him for his van keys. On that hot summer day his garbage cooked in the back
of his van all morning, filling the vehicle with a smell I'm sure the Teves people will never forget. Interestingly, one of the things
Tom Hamblen did when the sale of Hamblen Gage was imminent was ask his vice-president, who lives near him, how one would go about
getting curb-side trash pickup at their home. Of course the sale of Hamblen Gage didn't happen as fast as Tom Hamblen wanted and for
nearly three years after the Schaefer invasion, while they were making payments to him, Tom Hamblen continued to drive his garbage to
the former Hamblen Gage property and put it in the dumpster. The Schaefer's have finally paid Tom Hamblen off and have barred him from
the property, effectively revoking his dumpster privileges. Interesting Tommy being barred from the property, it would seem he couldn't
even get along with his own ilk. Maybe he lied to, or cheated, them also? Nevertheless, if you have dumpster service, it is suggested
you ask your service provider to install a lid lock to keep tightfisted vermin in search of a new place to dump from putting their
garbage in yours.
Late Night Indianapolis Chapter NTMA "Meeting"
Two Hamblen Gage sales people and the Hamblen Gage engineering manager were working late one evening trying
to finalize a huge quote that was due the next day. We thought it quite odd that Tom Hamblen would still be there,
but there he was, and it was almost 8 PM. Most unusual for Tom Hamblen, who could count on one hand the times he wasn't
the last to arrive or first to leave the office. Tom seemed a bit nervous and inquired of us a few times when we thought
we would finish and leave. We finished just after 8 PM and were heading out the door when in walked three people whom we
did not recognize at first. Tom Hamblen walked into the lobby at about the same time to greet them. He did not introduce
them to us, rather, Tom Hamblen told us "They are here for an NTMA meeting." It's not a stretch to believe that Tom
Hamblen thought we would be stupid enough to believe that the INTMA would meet with only four people present after 8 PM
at Hamblen Gage on a week night. Actually one of the Hamblen Gage sales people recognized one of the visitors because he had talked to
him at a local trade show. As it turns out, Tom Hamblen lied to us, if you can imagine that. The three people were
Steve Schaefer, Mike Schaefer, and Mike Rizzi, all of Schaefer Technologies. They were there meeting with Tom Hamblen
finalizing their offer to buy Hamblen Gage and to take a personally guided tour with Tom Hamblen as their host.
"Your Best Friend" Poor Tom Hamblen
A meeting was held by the Schaefer management six months after the pirates boarded the ship. They met with a few former-Hamblen sales,
engineering, and office employees in the conference room. They proceed to tell us that "Tom Hamblen was your best friend these last years."
They tell us that they had their "high dollar" accountants take a good look at Hamblen's books for the last few years. They continue to
tell us that Hamblen Gage has been loosing money since 1998. The closing act of the 'show' was taking a spreadsheet out, slowly
unfolding it, a telling us, "If you ever say I showed this to you I'll deny it." Big deal, but I'm sure the little drama played well with
the office girls, but the whole show was just a little too corny. In the first place the spreadsheet could have been made by a monkey on a
computer in less than two minutes, which is about the computer skill level of the new owners. The spreadsheet had six
columns and three rows. The columns were labeled 1998, 1999, 2000, and so forth. The second row was the annual gross sales for the
corresponding year. The third row had a negative number for all the years. He should have taken lying lessons from Tom Hamblen before he
tried to pull off this charade. In the first place, if I paid "high dollar" accountants and all I got in return was a three row, six column
spreadsheet I'd be an idiot. Secondly, the spreadsheet showed about $300 to $500 thousand dollar losses for each of the years,
including 1998, our best year ever, with over $8 million in sales. 1998 and 1999 alone netted Tom Hamblen at least $2 million in 'S' Corp.
dividends. In fact 1998's profits were the reason Tom Hamblen came up with the ESOP scam to avoid paying taxes on millions in profit.
The next couple years which were still over $6 million per year in sales also showed the same losses on the phony spreadsheet. You have
to ask yourself, why would Tom Hamblen be so elated with our sales and profits in those years if they were loses? Tom Hamblen's accountant
even said "It looks like the Hamblens hit the lottery again this year" about our 1998 & 1999 figures. Now here is the new owner trying to
convince us those years were losers. I and other people in attendance at this "side show" are convinced that the whole phony meeting was an
attempt by the new owner, either on Tom Hamblen's behalf, or at Tom Hamblen's request, to convince whoever filed the petition with the IRS
about Tom Hamblen's mishandling of the ESOP and related broken promises and lies to rescind their complaint. The petition was slowing down
Tom Hamblen's exit strategy and halted finalizing the sale of the company, at least for a while. And any grief and headaches we caused Tom Hamblen
were nothing like the pain he put on us. The only truth that came from the phony meeting is proving that the new owners are just like Tom Hamblen. They
think us all to be idiots and if it takes lying and cheating to get what they want, they are more than willing to do it. However, they do need
to polish their lying skills, which have probably been good enough for the girls they run with, but they are trying to lie in Tom Hamblen's
league, and they come up just a bit short.
The CMM
If you would like an example of Tom Hamblen's business prowess and leadership ability one need only remember the project he insisted he take
the reins on: Purchasing a Coordinate Measuring Machine (CMM). The sales and inspection departments were telling him we needed one, which we did,
we were constantly turning away work that needed a certified CMM inspection report and CMM inspection projects. Also it would add a great deal of
speed on repetitive checks of our own projects for the HGC inspector. We all figured out why Tom insisted to lead this project, he wanted
to spend little or no money on it. Tom then goes to a local dealer of CMMs to see what is available. True to his cheap nature he ends up buying
a demo that is so old the hardware and software are no longer supported by the manufacturer. So they bring it in, set it up, and we use it for
about six months. Then it breaks. Tom calls in the service people, a third party of course because the factory no longer supports it. Guess what,
it needs a new board and that will cost a third of what Tom paid for the machine but they cannot guarantee that the board is the problem. Tom
says no-way, he's not paying that kind of money with no guarantee it will work. So the machine sits for another six months. Tom then brings in yet
another third party service group. After that third party service team is in-and-out of HGC over a period of six months or so Tom fires them and
brings in yet another third party service group. They spend a week at HGC then decide they need to take the machine to their facility to fix it.
They bring it back two weeks later and it works for a little more than a day. Tom calls them and they tell him there is nothing more they can do
with it. So Tom brings in another third party who happens to be the same guy, now working as an independent, who came in for the first service
company. By this time the machine has been down for nearly two years. The independent service company convinces Tom he needs to spend roughly
half again what he paid for the machine and he can retrofit it with state-of-the-art hardware and software. He tells Tom it will be more accurate
than when it was new. Tom agrees and writes him a purchase order. Between all the service and the new controls Tom has now spent
more than he paid for the machine and we have only been able to use it for six months out of three years. Now it really gets good. The independent
installs the new hardware in such a manner that it is impossible to put the original hardware back in. He proceeds to come in about
twice a week for the next three or four months attempting to get it running. He finally gets it to move but it's accuracy is not good enough
for us to use the machine, and certainly not as good as when the machine was new. Tom calls in even more third party service people to try
to get it going and they spend the next year with no progress. Over the four plus years we had the machine we used it for a little over
six months at a cost of more than double the bargain Tom got buying the cheapest thing he could find. I think it is obvious why Tom Hamblen didn't
care if the CMM worked or not, he was preoccupied with selling the company, and he wasn't in the office often enough to know what was going on.
Was Tom Hamblen a good steward of the corporations' money and assets? Did Tom Hamblen really try to keep his ESOP promise of keeping Hamblen Gage
"technically current," or did he just do enough to keep his trail cold so we would not figure out what he was really up to? You can decide these
questions for yourself, but one thing is for certain, when the dust settled Tom Hamblen ended up with all but a pittance of Hamblen Gage's sale
price and no one was the wiser until it was too late. As for that squandered money testament of Tom Hamblen's business competence, the CMM Machine:
Last report is the Schaefer's sold it at scrap prices. It was just another boat anchor Tom Hamblen dropped hindering Hamblen Gage's continued existence.
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