Steve Heat(ph) works for Vermeer, which makes construction and farm equipment in Pella, Iowa.
Window maker Pella Corp. used to upgrade 2, 200 desktops and laptops every two years or so.
"I've struggled for 12 years to find the next Pella Corp. or Vermeer, " he says.
Unemployment in the Pella area stands at 4.2%, a full point below the national average.
Given the three-shift schedules at Pella Corp. and Vermeer, would employees have enough time to shop?
Founded in 1847 by Dutch immigrants, Pella provided rich soil for grain and corn.
Pella, a manufacturer of windows, used to upgrade 2, 200 desktops and laptops every two years or so.
Most of the city's dozen or so factory ventilation stacks belong to either Pella Corp. or Vermeer.
What eventually became Pella Corp. sells mostly residential windows and doors in North America, Japan and China.
Del Bonis came from behind to beat fellow Argentine Guido Pella 2-6 7-6 (7-4) 7-6 (7-1) on Tuesday.
Vermeer and Pella between them offer a combined 5, 500 nonunion jobs in a town where 7, 500 working-age adults live.
Sloping gambrel rooflines fill the downtown Pella streetscape, where stores still stock Dutch-spiced beef, Dutch lace and Dutch pastries.
What worries Vollmar in Pella is that he's not high on their list.
The average annual wage growth in Pella puts it 426 out of 573 small towns measured by the Policom Corp.
Such continual, incremental improvements have helped the two largest private employers in Pella keep manufacturing jobs from being exported abroad.
What you won't find in Pella is a union rep, despite some earnest rounds of knocking on doors by union organizers.
Blame the chilling effect for the painstaking seven years it took Vollmar to convince Brown's Shoes to open a store in Pella.
"I do realize I don't live in the real world sometimes, " allows David Vollmar, executive director of the Pella Area Chamber of Commerce.
While driving up their efficiency, Pella Corp. and Vermeer have effectively slammed the door on other sizable businesses that have tried to plant a foot.
As a two-company town, Pella can't inoculate itself against a downturn.
In the past few years Lowe's has pushed hard to become the exclusive big-box seller of prestige brands, such as Husqvarna chain saws and Pella windows.
Strict union job classifications stifle innovation, says William Schwartz, a business consultant who has run workshops at Pella Corp. on kaizen, the Japanese art of continual improvement.
Some 71km after Thessaloniki, the Egnatia Odos passes Veria, a small town with several worthwhile Byzantine shrines and nearby archeological sites like the ancient Macedonian Pella and Vergina.
BBC: Driving Greece's modern ancient highway, the Egnatia Odos
Not exactly a millionaire's refuge, but in how many other rural spots can you play the quintessential capitalist sport, golf, as you can at Pella's own Bos Landen Golf Resort?
Pella had an army of window plant workers after World War II, when farmer Gary Vermeer turned a modest invention--a modified farm wagon with a mechanical hoist--into a company in 1948.
One such session gave rise to a Pella innovation this year: between-the-glass cordless blinds and shades (window and patio-door treatments tucked between panes of glass and away from dust and yanks from kids).
For now the 31-year-old plant manager is content to lord over a factory floor of Vermeer Manufacturing Co. in Pella, Iowa, pointing to a directional drill assembly line that used to be cluttered with 20 days' worth of parts inventory.
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