ABOUT BARNEY'S PUMPS
Three Generations of Pump Sales, Solutions & Service
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70 YEARS OF EXPERIENCE & COUNTING... |
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BARNEY'S PUMPS BRAND VIDEO | ABOUT US |
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OUR HISTORY
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Since the time when founder Barney Curls first began selling pumps in 1950, Barney's Pumps has become a choice provider of pumps, controls, mixers and systems. Each generation adds to the culture, business practices, and industries served. From the 1950's Barney Curls served the agriculture, citrus, and phosphate industries. In the 1980's John Curls Sr. developed products for the lift station, water and wastewater treatment plants. Today, the brand's fabrication facilities boast quality control and functionality throughout all segments of the packaging process. So, whether the job is to effectively manage wastewater networks or supply hygienic and sensitive product transfer for beverage companies, we stake our name in providing premier technical pump solutions. |
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Because we have a hand in every touchpoint of the packaging process, we are constantly expanding our team's abilities to involve the latest technologies, provide solutions to new industries and evolve our engineering capabilities. Backed by a devoted team of 80+ industry experts and professional engineers, we proudly operate our entire production in house, which allows us to ensure quality control and excellent customer service for every product and solution. |
OUR BARNEY'S
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John Curls Senior, chairman of the board of Barney's Pumps Inc.
Image and article by The Lakelander Magazine. |
LEGACY & LINEAGEWRITTEN BY JOEL HELM
“Nobody ever said being a parent was easy. Nobody said being a child was easy, either.” John Curls Senior, chairman of the board of Barney’s Pumps Incorporated, has experience with both. Curls Sr. has two sons, John Curls Jr. and Matt Curls, both of whom he’s brought into the business. His father, Barney, started the business in 1950. “My dad was one of the tremendous success stories out of World War II,” Curls Sr. says. “Tom Brokaw called them ‘The Greatest Generation.’ Lakeland had several [success stories]: Jenkins Lincoln/Mercury, Linder, Harrell’s. My dad started Barney’s Pumps.” |
VIEW ENTIRE ARTICLE FROM THE LAKELANDER
Written By Joel Helm
“Nobody ever said being a parent was easy. Nobody said being a child was easy, either.”
John Curls Senior, chairman of the board of Barney’s Pumps Incorporated, has experience with both. Curls Sr. has two sons, John Curls Jr. and Matt Curls, both of whom he’s brought into the business. His father, Barney, started the business in 1950. “My dad was one of the tremendous success stories out of World War II,” Curls Sr. says. “Tom Brokaw called them ‘The Greatest Generation.’ Lakeland had several [success stories]: Jenkins Lincoln/Mercury, Linder, Harrell’s. My dad started Barney’s Pumps.”
The business, like so many other small business success stories, was born out of Barney Curls’ uncovering an unserved market. “There were no other local pump distributors that did application work. All application work was done in the factories in the Northeast.”
Application work turned out to be a successful model to bring local. Over the next 30 years, Barney Curls steadily grew the business. “In his day, there were no people with any pump knowledge selling pumps,” says Curls Jr. “The whole distribution model had not evolved to where it is today. The only pump experts worked for the manufacturers. To better serve customers, Barney started learning, hiring, and teaching salesman about pumps so we could be local experts and apply the right solutions.”
By the early 1980s, Barney Curls decided he wanted to retire, hiring a succession of presidents. “None of them exhibited a pure absolute commitment of ownership,” Curls Sr. says. “They had not gone through the struggle; they had no dog in the hunt.” At the time, Curls Sr. was working in the industry, but not for his dad. “I did not want to work for my dad,” Sr. jokes, “so I didn’t. I agreed to buy Barney’s Pumps.” In 1982, Curls Sr. bought BPI with 20 employees, generating $3 million in revenue. Revenue, Sr. soon found out, doesn’t equate to profit.
“I didn’t have the money to buy (BPI), so I agreed to a long-term payout.” The Curls agreed to a sales price of $2.5 million over the course of 10 years. “Come to find out, the company had $2,500 in the bank, and a $750,000 debt to People’s Bank of Lakeland.” To make things worse, the note stated that any time Barney Curls did not have majority interest in BPI, the note would be called. “Three months after I bought it, they called it. I didn’t have seven hundred and fifty thousand dollars.”
What Barney Curls didn’t know, and what John Curls Sr. was just then learning, was the succession of presidents had run the business for cash for themselves. “We had three million in inventory on the books. All that inventory was obsolete. We couldn’t sell it. And we had twenty-five hundred dollars.”
Curls Sr. had to have a tough conversation with his dad. “I went to Dad, and I said, ‘Do you know what this is? It’s bankrupt. And Dad came and looked.” Barney Curls immediately canceled the note he had with his son. “It was too late for me to go back to where I was,” says Sr. “I told Dad, ‘Let me see if I can save it.’
“Paul Norris [now of Bank of Central Florida] was brand-spanking-new at SunTrust, when I went to him and said, ‘I gotta have help.’ And they agreed to take a chance on us.”
Ten years of $80,000 payments later, Curls Sr. and Barney’s Pumps were in a completely different position. They’d acquired another pump manufacturer, sold nearly all their obsolete inventory, and more than doubled in size. “Paul Norris came out here for a barbecue lunch, and burned the mortgage note. Dropped it out on the loading dock. It was a celebration.”
Not long after that celebration came another major addition. In 1994, John Curls Jr. joined the company his grandfather started and his dad resurrected. “I was working for GE making parts for nuclear weapons,” says Curls Jr. “My dad called me and said that the employees wanted to buy the company. If I didn’t come back, then he was going to sell it. So, I came back.”
By the time his son joined his blossoming company, Sr. had taken it to new heights. The company was now generating $10 million in revenue with close to 80 employees — a far cry from $2,500 in the bank and $750,000 in debt. One of the things Jr. hoped to bring to the table, however, was a push towards bringing BPI into the modern world. “Coming back from GE to BPI was like a time warp. I was doing 3D modeling and finite element analysis. Barney’s had one computer.”
Despite being the grandson of the business’ founder and Sr.’s son, Jr. had to prove himself when he arrived. “I started as an application engineer, making $36,000 a year, which was less than I was making at GE.” Curls Jr. went from an application engineer into sales, and from sales to sales management, proving himself along the way. “There’s nothing in life more rewarding than seeing your children succeed,” says Sr.
Succeed, he has. Today, John Curl Jr. is Barney’s Pumps’ CEO, overseeing a new generation of leaders at the company. The company’s long-term President, Greg Riching, recently retired. Riching’s daughter, Kate Marshall, is the company’s CFO. Robbie Pearce, a former BPI applications engineer himself, climbed through company ranks and was named Greg’s replacement. “You need to home-grow your people,” Sr. says. “Now I’m fixing to turn it over to John. He’s going to be the leader. People want to know we have a succession plan.”
“Barney started it. My dad grew it,” Jr. says. “I want to take Barney’s to the next level.”
“It’s been fun,” says Sr. “Nobody said being a parent was easy. Nobody said being a child was easy. But in the end, to see that work … what else would you ever strive for in life, other than seeing your children succeed?”
From serving the agriculture, citrus and phosphate industries in the 1950's to effectively managing wastewater networks and food-grade product transfers today, Barney's Pumps has continued to invest in certifications to best serve the needs of its customers. With more than 80 industry experts and professional engineers, and 65 years under our belt, we pride ourselves in ensuring our services and expertise meet our customers' needs. |
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BARNEY'S PUMPS | WHO WE ARE |
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OUR CERTIFICATIONS
UL 508A
Standard for Industrial Control Panels |
UL 698A
Standard for Industrial Control Panels Relating to Hazardous (Classified) Locations |
UL QCZJ
Packaged Pumping System |
American Welding Society
D1.1 - Structural Welding Code - Steel |
American Welding Society
D1.6 - Structural Welding Code - Stainless Steel |
ISO 18436-2
Condition monitoring and diagnostics of machines - Vibration condition monitoring and diagnostics |
ISA CAP
Certified Automation Professional |
Flowserve Gold Certification
Factory authorized repair center for industrial pumps |
Netzsch
Certified Repair Center |
Trihedral / VTScada
Solution Provider |
Schneider Electric
Solutions Provider |
Rockwell Automation
Partner Network Member |
