Steve Staub: Antique gas pumps to robot-welded truck parts

Steve Staub grew up in Vandalia and came to Tipp City when he was 21 years old. “I’ve only made it about eight miles from where I was born”, he joked. “Some people travel around the world, but I only made it from Vandalia to Tipp.” Steve has been married to Erin for 26 years now, and he says, “She was working and carried the business for a long time when it was growing.” Erin is currently involved with the Community Minded Women organization, and in the past has served on the Dayton Children’s Hospital Women’s Board, Friends of Hayner, and CASAGAL of Miami County Board. Steve and Erin have two daughters, Maddie and Amelia.             

When Steve was 17, he bought all the speakers from Miller’s Grove Drive-In Theater and began restoring and selling them. Over the next ten year period, he sold over 3,000. At about the same time, Steve’s dad, who was a collector of antique signs, old cars, and glass-cylinder gas pumps, opened a store on N. Second St. in Tipp, and Steve joined him in the business. In that store and later, in the building which is now Tipp City Pizza, they began manufacturing 1920 glass-cylinder gas pumps, using a plastic-injection mold machine. They also began buying old traffic lights, about 50 to 75 a month, and selling them to Hard Rock Cafes, Universal Studios, Paramount Parks, Kings Island, and shipping them overseas to England.

Eventually, the nostalgic items supply dried up, and in the early 90’s they contracted with a factory to make new drive-in theater speakers, and you can still see them today in such places as Disneyland in Florida, Steve remarked. 

Around 1997, Steve’s dad sold his manufacturing company, AlphaMold, retired, and helped Steve and his sister, Sandy Keplinger, start a new company, Staub Manufacturing Solutions. The new company initially used laser cutting machines on steel, aluminum, and stainless steel to continue making nostalgic items. Eventually, they sold all the different nostalgic product lines and began making components for other manufacturers. Today, they produce bedframes for Volvo and Mack semi-truck sleeper cabs using a robotic welder, Kenworth and Peterbilt truck bumper brackets, medical equipment to aid in surgeries, kitchen equipment for restaurants, and a wide variety of components for other industries. 

Steve says they have been very fortunate, and “have an amazing group of people, a really great team, which delivers quality and responsive delivery better than competitors. Our employee turnover is under 5%, compared to the average of 39%”, he notes. He says, “I’m still looking to grow the business, still looking for new technologies. We bought the building next door, just in case we decide to expand.” 

Steve has been an active supporter of Tipp City events, successfully campaigning for a Friday night Cruise-In during the Mum Festival. He is presently a member of the Community Improvement Corporation (CIC) of Tipp City, a group of Tipp businesspeople offering business advice to the city. 

Steve Staub has also been active outside Tipp City, attending a meeting of manufacturers at the White house with his sister, Sandy, and company welder Corey Adams. He emphasized that 85% of manufacturers have under 25 people, and of the 85%, half have under 10 people. Steve also attended a “small” round table in Washington, DC, for a business discussion with the heads of Samsung USA, Toyota USA, and Engersoll-Rand, USA. Steve said he felt a little out of their league. 

Steve has been on the Board of Directors of the National Association of Manufacturers, the Board of Directors of the Ohio Manufacturers Association, and the Board for the Hobart Institute of Technology (for welding). He says that people don’t realize that in a lifetime, the average welder makes as much money as the average attorney. “There’s lots of opportunity out there”, he says. “We have seven welders at our shop.”  He was also one of the founders and President of a non-profit called XtremeSTEM (https://www.xtremestem.org/). The purpose is to get students starting in 5th grade interested in STEM, Advanced Manufacturing, Engineering and Aerospace careers.

I asked Steve how he maintains such a productive and employee-friendly workplace. He responded, with a slight smile, “I hire people smarter than me. Everyone who works with us is smarter than I am, so that works out well.”