Like most Americans, the Van Hercke family had too much
stuff. The accumulation of several years of marriage and two young boys—kids’
clothes, toys, baby furniture, plus the power tools and other equipment from Tom
Van Hercke’s woodworking shop—required them to turn their garage into a storage
facility.
“We couldn’t find a single set of modular home storage units that would work for us efficiently,” Van Hercke recalls. So he created his own, a line that could be configured and reconfigured for nearly any location—garage, garden, kitchen, playroom, home office.
According to a study Van Hercke conducted, demand for home storage products is expected to grow at 8.9 percent annually for the next three years. And he has the industrial design background to take advantage of the opportunity. During the 1990s, he held an equity stake in Haas Multiples, a builder of custom displays for trade shows and retail stores that grew to $60 million in annual sales before it was acquired. Van Hercke later cofounded nParallel, a Plymouth designer of trade-show displays. He left in 2005 to start his storage products company.
Hercke International’s storage units are constructed from sleek stainless steel; a more expensive line uses powder-coated steel. The key component in both versions is a connecting hinge that Van Hercke invented. The hinge allows each unit to be assembled without bolts. Instead, hinge rods slide through cylinders, and are then screwed into place. Specially designed clips align and interconnect the stackable units, which ship flat. Teakwood or composite tops are available as work surfaces. The overarching themes here are ease in transport and simplicity in reconfiguring the units to accommodate changing storage needs. Prices for the modular units start at $159.
As COO, Katy Van Hercke manages the business operations for the Minneapolis-based firm; her husband, Tom, CEO, oversees design and sales. Products are manufactured in Taiwan and Thailand. The company will be selling through major specialty dealers (including independents and national franchises), other retailers’ catalogs, and its own Web site, www.hercke.com. Its products are available locally at Gander Mountain and on line from www.jnkproducts.com. Hercke International is also planning to have retail stores in the Twin Cities market, which it expects to open in early 2008.
