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Waterloo! J3pring rl Co. L.tti,t_iii The next week rolled around and he had failed to raise the money Hus banker refused hum a loan because he had doubts that a postal clerk would know anything about run- mng a company Years later. that same banker admitted his mistake HIS first employee was brother-in-law Fred Lau- tensehlager. "a man I hired off the street who didn't know a spring from a load of hay '. But he hired hum anyway In I936. the Fred Kreuger estate put the Waterloo Spring Co up for sale The company. located at that time at 51 William St West m Waterloo. was being sold for $3.000 After I7 years his $32-a-week salary was totally used up supporting his family and It just barely kept pace With buy- mg the necessltles for survival. Needless to say. Horas didn't have the $100 needed to make a down-payment to purchase the company After paying for his family neceMu- hes. Ins sayings amounted to a mere $5 e was "always full of optimism" and he wanted the com- y badly He somehow managed to convince the estate to him the business. property and spring-making equtp- ment housed In the 3.006-square-foot facility for $5 down and the remammg $95 the following week Mrs Kreuger was fed up running the company and dead- ed to go ahead with the sale anyway Huras ran the company himself while continuing tus job at the post office He made furniture springs and delivered them to factories by loading them on hrs Ford Model A His mechanical abilities surfaced at an early age While growmg up on a farm In Wellesley. Ont ' he made his own toys. slenghs and wagons Back in 1909, at the age of 12. Horas built an electric motor He had visions of motorlzmg an old family buggy. but had little success With the project Firm link fabric suspension to support the sofa bed mattress is manufactured heavy duty helical springs. The links are fashioned into I "fishmouth" pattern from strands of sinuous wire. The link fabric is rust prooled and supported by to interconnect them. . Huras felt he was wasting his mechanical talents selling stamps. making out money orders and sorting mail. The pay was poor. to say the least. and It just wasn't something he was cut out to do By Stewart Sutherland Chronicle staff writer n 1920. following his discharge from the Canadian Army, in I) Huras was supporting his family of six by working e Kitchener post office on a weekly salary of $25. Seven- teen yeaars later his wages had risen to only $32 a week. In 1938 he found Richard Bellstmn who used to help out . . W 'll',!! t _ dly, t A. ot/ -, T ' ' gt, "tals', I: In January, 1970 the company moved Into Its first brand new quarters at 45l Phillip St. in Waterloo The original 32.000 square-foot plant. located on a 12 acre site. has since been expanded several times to its present Size of 200.000 square-feet on a site of some 25 acres The Breithaupt St complex of buildings was acquired by a Waterloo developer and the former Lady Belle building was dtmolished seven?! years ago to make way for a parking lot The company has aggressively pursued export markets during the past several years. according to Huras ln l938 Huras bought the former two-storey Lady Belle shoe factory at l02 Breithaupt St. in Kitchener. after selling the William St building for a tMo profit, The profit enabled him to finance the purchase of a building four times the Size of the original Something strange was taking blace In the Twin Cities at this time James. 49. jmned the company upon graduation from the University of Western Ontario In London where he received his degree In honors business In 1952 He later increased the Size of his facilities to 33.000 square feet by purchasing the adjonmng property. The company was making kuidy cars, baby buggies and children's wagons along with the ever-present springs for furniture Waterloo Spring currently employs 110 full- and part-time personnel Edwm Huras retired m 1978 and appointed his son James S Huras as president William V Berth. part owner of the company, was appointed vice-president ' During the first year of business on William St. the com- pany sold $12,000 worth of goods and has never looked back, Waterloo Spring was located in Kitchener and the Kitchener Spring Co Ltd . started by his brother E, I Huras was located In Waterloo, Huras framed the $5 partial down-payment receipt and kept " hanging in his office for years as a permanent re- minder that he started With very little in the way of capital. His son still has it in his office. after school, working on a machine "Aren't you supposed to be in school?" he asked Beilstein, "No, rm working here full-time now," he told Huras. Apparently he had "hired himself" and is still working for the company as the shipping and receiving supervisor. Waterloé p_tertrte.'wodmrttiav, Noygmbor 28, 1979 - Several large American companies have attempted to buy the Waterloo company but the Huras farmly has refused all offers preferring to keep things Canadian They d.on't want American companies eommg here and putting Canadian companies out of business Huras says he has no Immediate plans for the future of the company other than reaching that two millionth mark for sofa beds "The funds for expansnon are available when needed and we re-mvest our profits back into the company." Huras said The units saw further design changes In 1965 and the com- pany applied for the first over-the-rail sofa bed patent at this time, The model simplified wood frame construction and enabled designers to create sofa beds that appear simi- lar to stationary couches. They could now be part of the living room setting instead of being releéated to family rooms or dens as in the past Huras finds It "challenging but not difficult" running a wholly Canadian-owned family business Realizing the potential of the product. Waterloo Spring redesigned the mechanism making it more durable and functional and introduced it to Canadian furniture makers in 1952. They haven't looked back since . The first sofa bed was produced in 1952 in the United States Furniture makers brought back samples of the pre duct from south of the border with an eye on producing them here in an effort to save on the exchange, duty and long-dis- tance shipping charges. The company built 100 of the units based on the original but found them unsatisfactory, The millionth sofa bed mechanism rolled off the assembly line last September. It took the company 27 years to reach this landmark. Furniture industry analysts expert the pro- duction of sofa beds to double by 1985. “If this is true, the two milliohth mark will be reached in a much shorter time." Huras predicted The company not only makes springs for furniture. but mechanisms for living room furniture including sofa beds and recliner chairs and designs and makes much of its own machinery and equipment out of necessity. "We have monthly shipments of our products to the Unit- ed States and Australia with several inquiries from several countries in Europe, but we're not actively pursuing these inquiries." Huras said. Pam 9