Poly Tech Industries Is Rooted in Faith
Poly Tech Industries is an engineering plastics firm founded on family-based principles and faith. Next year the local company located in the Monticello Industrial Park will celebrate 40 years in business.
So what is it that the firm actually does? The simple answer is make plastic parts for farm equipment. To the average reader less than thrilled about John Deere and Kubota products that could sound like boring stuff. Not so. A tour of the facility providing a glimpse into the big picture would make one think otherwise.
O.K., so you can’t really relate to tractors or combines; if tech savvy you can relate to ipads and smartphones. If the owner of any such products think about the value, monetary and sentimental, of said gadgets you go the extra mile to protect it from haphazard and prolong its utility like purchasing protective screen films, anti-glare devices, cases, etc.
Poly Tech produces parts that aid farm equipment manufacturers with extending the longevity and usefulness of their product.
Family patriarch and matriarch Dean and Gloria Rabitsch, now deceased, began the business in 1975. Upon moving to Monticello, Mr. Rabitsch took a job at the Monticello Bobbin company where he took an interest in plastics. After some time he approached the owner about buying the bobbin company. He was rebuffed and, according to his son and current manager, Jimmy Rabitsch, the Lord led his father to start the business. The rest is history.
The original location for the firm was in Kelly, a small community on Hwy. 142 in north Jasper County. The first patent for Dean Rabitsch came in 1988 and another in 1992 for widely known John Deere. With the patents came increased business and growth so the company relocated to its current location as one of the first businesses to set up shop in the local industrial park.
Jimmy was much younger when the move occurred but he remembers it vividly because there were no paved roads in the industrial park at that time.
That was then and this is now. Business has grown. In addition to selling their parts to John Deere, Adco and myriad other independent representatives, Poly Tech parts are distributed to Canada, Australia, South Africa, and as of this week Honduras. Not bad for a small family-based business.
{{more}}
While business has grown throughout the decades the founding principles have remained the same. In the absence of their parents, the business is operated by siblings Tammy Boggs, Patty Batchelor, and Jimmy. Keeping the integrity of the business their parents founded is key.
“We are Christian-oriented. Our father started it that way and we’ve kept it that way.”
The company’s logo includes the scripture passage Joshua 24: 15 ~ As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord. The owners advertise faithfully each week in The News with a different quote thata serves as “encouraging words” in each publication.
“We want to be a good business in the community,” said Jimmy.
The firm, which employs 16-20 people depending on the season, hires local people for local jobs said the manager. It’s also important to support both school systems, he added.
“In an effort to be good citizens and stewards in the community those are the things you do.”
Jimmy, who rose through the ranks from a young age, has worked every facet of the business from cleaning to selling to creating his own patent proudly. But in addition to managing the business now, the siblings have got their eyes on training the next generation for the family business.
