These aren’t just nice sounding words. Across all brands of ACP, we try to live this model daily. We may not always do it perfectly, but it is our ideal standard.

In 2022, ACP began a transition to reflect this model in the ownership of our company. ACP became 100% Employee-Owned. Technically, we formed an Employee Ownership Trust (EOT), which is a fairly new form of Employee-Ownership in the United States. We were the first EOT in the State of Texas.

Our founder, Joe Nussbaum, remains the company President, and plans to stay with ACP until the Employee-Ownership transition is fully complete in 2028.

Below, Joe tells the reasoning why he chose the employee-ownership route in his own words:

When I started this company in 1986, I had no idea it would mature and grow into what is has become today. We’re not a big company. We’ve got a few more than 60 employees, but I never imagined we’d reach this level of size or success.

A few years ago, someone asked me this question: To what do I attribute our company’s success? I thought about it a while and came up with an answer. Every day, I believe that answer is more accurate.

We have done well because we have long-term, respected employees who have contributed expertise, dedication, and a can-do attitude to everything we try and do. They have benefitted when we have success, but they also helped us fight through lean times.

We have done well because we have long-term vendors who have provided us help and expertise when we needed it. I think these vendors view us as a very good customer, but they’ve also been there to help us when situations weren’t so rosy.

We have done well because we have solid, long-term customers that we really enjoy working with. We strive to offer them high value products while being easy to work with. We want our customers to have success, and they want the same for us. That, my friends, is a great way to be in business.

Finally, we have had success because we have been free of third-party debt for our entire existence. It is a whole lot easier when a company’s first dollars can go toward satisfying a customer rather than satisfying a bank.

These are the reasons ACP has been successful.

It is said that time stops for no one. Well, it is true for me. One day in 2021 I woke up and said “I’m getting older. I need to think about business succession and retirement.” By the way, it is also a sign of getting older when you wake up in the morning and immediately begin talking to yourself, but that’s beside the point.

Anyway, I started looking at business succession options. Over and over, I noticed that business owners I knew who sold to private equity companies ultimately regretted it. Mainly because of the high debt load put upon the newly sold company, their employees endured cutbacks and layoffs. Their vendors and customers had to endure changes that were difficult. Many times, the company was moved out of their home town. Yes, the sale may have worked for the seller financially, but little else was good, even for the seller. I’ve said that the seller ended up with a fat wallet but a broken heart.

I didn’t want that for myself or for ACP. I want the people who made our company successful to benefit from an eventual business transition. That meant it had to work well for our employees, our vendors and our customers.

That’s why Employee-ownership made sense to me. Because we have the stability of debt-free, long term employee ownership, ACP will remain in Arlington, Texas for a long time, keep long term employees who thrive, maintain quality vendors, and have long-term positive working relationships with great customers. I said earlier that this is a great way to be in business. It is also a great way to stay in business.

I don’t want this to sound like I’ve made some sacrificial charitable donation. I haven’t. This transition to employee-ownership has worked out very well for me too. I’m excited to be a part of it for the next several years.

Finally, for any of you reading this that have an interest in exploring employee-ownership, I’m happy to visit with you about it. I think it is a great “under the radar” option for business transition.