Kimball International

Last updated
Kimball International
FormerlyW. W. Kimball & Co. and Jasper Corporation
Company type Public
IndustryFurniture - commercial office, healthcare, education and hospitality
Founded
  • 1857;167 years ago (1857),
  • in Chicago, Illinois, U.S. and then 1950 in Jasper, Indiana
Founder William Wallace Kimball (W.W. Kimball) and Arnold Habig (Jasper Corporation)
Headquarters Jasper, Indiana
Area served
Worldwide
Number of employees
2500
Website www.kimballinternational.com

Kimball International consists of furniture brands: Kimball, National, Interwoven, Etc., David Edward, D'Style and Kimball Hospitality. It is the successor to W.W. Kimball and Company, the world's largest piano and organ manufacturer at certain times in the 19th and 20th centuries.

Contents

On March 8, 2023, HNI Corporation entered into an agreement to purchase Kimball International. [1] On June 1, 2023, the acquisition was completed. [2]

History

Kimball Piano and Organ

This division started as a piano dealership in Chicago in 1857 as W.W. Kimball and Company by William Wallace Kimball (1828–1904). In 1864, Kimball moved from its earliest location in the corner of a jewelry store to sales rooms in the Crosby Opera House where Kimball sold pianos made by East Coast piano makers Chickering and Sons, the J & C Fischer Piano Company, Hallet & Davis, F.C. Lighte, Joseph P. Hale, and the W.P. Emerson Piano Company. Kimball also sold less expensive reed organs. The Great Chicago Fire destroyed all of Kimball's commercial assets in 1871, but he continued selling from his home, and rebuilt his dealership business. [3]

In 1877, W.W. Kimball began assembling its own reed organs, using actions made by the J.G. Earhuff Company and cases made by contractors. After three years, the company began offering organs made entirely in house. In 1882, the Kimball company was incorporated, and an expansive factory was built to produce reed organs. Soon, the factory was producing 15,000 organs a year; the world's largest organ maker. [3] Kimball stopped making reed organs in 1922 after having produced 403,390 instruments. [3]

In 1887, Kimball began building a five-story factory for making its own pianos, and the next year produced 500 instruments of unremarkable quality. Kimball hired veterans from Steinway & Sons and C. Bechstein Pianofortefabrik, and these men initiated improvements to the piano line. By 1893 at the World's Columbian Exposition, at which Kimball received the "Worlds Columbian Exposition Award", Kimball was known for high quality, efficiency in manufacture, and aggressive sales practices using 35–40 traveling salesmen to cover cities and remote areas. Prominent East Coast piano makers snubbed the Chicago exposition because they feared Chicago favoritism, and because of philosophical differences between their reliance on traditional name brand faithfulness and Kimball's streamlined modern efficiency which greatly threatened their sales. [3]

A Kimball Reed Organ. Kimball Organ.jpg
A Kimball Reed Organ.

In 1890, Kimball hired Englishman Frederic W. Hedgeland, trained at his family's organworks in London: W.M. Hedgeland. Hedgeland supervised a portable pipe organ design about the size of a large upright piano. The pipe organ division of Kimball also built large, permanent pipe organs, including one for the Mormon Tabernacle in 1901. When the pipe organ division was closed down in 1942, some 7,326 models had been built. [3]

Kimball was involved in making player pianos, the first effort being an automatic mechanism in 1901. As well, from 1917 to 1929, Kimball produced an attractive line of cabinet phonographs. [3]

During World War II, Kimball produced aircraft parts for major military airplane manufacturers such as Boeing, Douglas and Lockheed. After the war, piano production resumed but a series of poor financial decisions by W.W. Kimball Jr led the company into decline. In the mid-1950s, Kimball built a luxurious new factory in the Chicago suburb of Melrose Park, Illinois, but the factory's high costs, its poor performance, and flagging sales brought the company into grave financial crisis. [3] Kimball had slipped from being the world's largest piano maker to the seventh largest, and it was nearly insolvent. [4]

In 1959, the W.W. Kimball Company was purchased from the last remaining Kimball family heir by Mr. Arnold F. Habig, becoming a wholly owned subsidiary of The Jasper Corporation which began operations in 1950 and founded by Mr. Arnold F. Habig. The combined company was later renamed Kimball International.

Piano production was relocated to the small, southern Indiana town of West Baden, Indiana, where the company was rejuvenated and once again began to grow. Ten years after the purchase, Kimball was once again the world's largest piano company.

Jasper Corporation to Kimball International

The Jasper Corporation was founded in 1950 in Jasper, Indiana, by Mr. Arnold Habig to make television cabinets, cabinets, and furniture. [4] Jasper Corporation prospered from expanding television sales and from its investment in vertical integration, giving the company self-sufficiency. In 1959, Jasper, Inc., purchased the W. W. Kimball Company as a wholly owned subsidiary. Jasper moved its Kimball piano manufacturing to West Baden Springs in 1961; some 26 miles (42 km) northeast of the town of Jasper. [3] [4] The first Indiana-made pianos were plagued with quality problems, but the issues were addressed and the pianos improved. [3] In 1966, Jasper bought the prestigious Austrian piano maker Bösendorfer. [3]

By 1969, Kimball had returned to its former position as the world's largest piano maker. [4] The subsidiary made some 100,000 pianos and organs annually during its peak years in the 1960s and 1970s. [4] An average day saw 250 pianos and 150 electronic organs shipped from the factory. [4] Grand pianos from Kimball in Indiana ranged from compact 4-foot-5-inch (135 cm) models to larger 6-foot-7-inch (201 cm) models. In Vienna, the Bösendorfer division made concert grand pianos as large as 9 feet 6 inches (290 cm): the Imperial Bösendorfer. Kimball also made upright pianos in 42-inch (110 cm) and 46-inch (120 cm) sizes, but not smaller spinet models; a decision which allowed great profits to be made by competitors. [3] However, Kimball produced inexpensive console pianos, between upright and spinet size, in a subsidiary plant across the Texas–Mexico border in Reynosa, doing business as Kimco. [3]

Based on the success of piano and organ sales, Jasper determined to leverage the Kimball brand recognition to assist sales of office furniture, home furniture and electronics. [4] Company leaders realized that the Kimball brand had far greater popular recognition than the Jasper brand, [3] and in 1974, Jasper changed its name to Kimball International, going public in September 1976 with the initial public offering of 500,000 shares of common stock. [4]

In 1980 Kimball International bought Krakauer Brothers, a New York piano maker founded in 1869, and Conn Keyboards, the piano and organ division of C.G. Conn ltd. The acquisitions were ill-timed, as piano and organ sales were in a long-term downward trend. In 1984, Kimball shipped and loaned 84 baby grands to the Los Angeles Olympic Organizing Committee for their use at the Los Angeles 1984 Olympic Opening Ceremony. In a section devoted to the Hollywood musical with George Gershwin's "Rhapsody in Blue" as the main theme, the 84 baby grands were rolled out under the arches of the L.A. Memorial Coliseum. Kimball operated Krakauer for five years in New York before closing the plant. [3]

Because of a worldwide decline in piano and organ purchases through the 1980s and 1990s, the Kimball piano and organ subsidiary was discontinued in February 1996. The last Kimball grand piano was signed by every worker and company executive, and remains on display at Kimball's showroom in Jasper, Indiana. [4] The Bösendorfer piano brand continued unaffected, but was sold back to Austrian buyers in 2002. [3]

Today

On October 31, 2014, Kimball International announced the spin-off of Kimball Electronics resulting in a new furniture company.

Kimball

The Kimball brand made its first desk in 1970. Kimball expanded its offerings into a broad product line, including casegoods, systems, seating, filing, and tables.

Kimball is based in Jasper, Indiana, operates manufacturing facilities in Jasper, and in Salem, and has showroom locations in major metropolitan areas around the U.S.

National

In 1980, Kimball International formed National Office Furniture to make mid-priced office furniture.

Kimball Hospitality

Kimball International entered the lodging market in 1985. Kimball Hospitality has furnished over 14,000 rooms in Las Vegas's hotels and casinos.[ citation needed ]

Awards and honors

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Lyon & Healy</span> American harp manufacturer

Lyon & Healy Harps, Inc. is an American musical instrument manufacturer based in Chicago, Illinois and is a subsidiary of Salvi Harps. Today best known for concert harps, the company's Chicago headquarters and manufacturing facility contains a showroom and concert hall. George W. Lyon and Patrick J. Healy began the company in 1864 as a sheet music shop. By the end of the 19th century, they manufactured a wide range of musical instruments—including not only harps, but pianos, guitars, mandolins, banjos, ukuleles and various brass and other percussion instruments.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Yamaha Corporation</span> Japanese music and audio equipment maker

Yamaha Corporation is a Japanese musical instrument and audio equipment manufacturer.

Kawai Musical Instruments Manufacturing Co., Ltd. is a musical instrument manufacturing company headquartered in Hamamatsu, Shizuoka, Japan. It is best known for its grand pianos, upright pianos, digital pianos, electronic keyboards and electronic synthesizers. The company was founded in August 1927.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Rodgers Instruments</span> American manufacturer

Rodgers Instruments Corporation is an American manufacturer of classical and church organs. Rodgers was incorporated May 1, 1958 in Beaverton, Oregon by founders, Rodgers W. Jenkins and Fred Tinker, employees of Tektronix, Inc., of Portland, Oregon, and members of a Tektronix team developing transistor-based oscillator circuits. Rodgers was the second manufacturer of solid state oscillator-based organs, completing their first instrument in 1958. Other Rodgers innovations in the electronic organ industry include solid-state organ amplifiers (1962), single-contact diode keying (1961), reed switch pedal keying for pedalboards (1961), programmable computer memory pistons (1966), and the first MIDI-supported church organs (1986).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Wurlitzer</span> American company of music boxes and instruments

The Rudolph Wurlitzer Company, usually referred to as simply Wurlitzer, is an American company started in Cincinnati in 1853 by German immigrant (Franz) Rudolph Wurlitzer. The company initially imported stringed, woodwind and brass instruments from Germany for resale in the United States. Wurlitzer enjoyed initial success, largely due to defense contracts to provide musical instruments to the U.S. military. In 1880, the company began manufacturing pianos and eventually relocated to North Tonawanda, New York. It quickly expanded to make band organs, orchestrions, player pianos and pipe or theatre organs popular in theatres during the days of silent movies.

C. G. Conn Ltd., sometimes called Conn Instruments or commonly just Conn, is a former American manufacturer of musical instruments incorporated in 1915. It bought the production facilities owned by Charles Gerard Conn, a major figure in early manufacture of brasswinds and saxophones in the USA. Its early business was based primarily on brass instruments, which were manufactured in Elkhart, Indiana. During the 1950s the bulk of its sales revenue shifted to electric organs. In 1969 the company was sold in bankruptcy to the Crowell-Collier-MacMillan publishing company. Conn was divested of its Elkhart production facilities in 1970, leaving remaining production in satellite facilities and contractor sources.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bösendorfer</span> Austrian piano manufacturer

Bösendorfer is an Austrian piano manufacturer and, since 2008, a wholly owned subsidiary of Yamaha Corporation. Bösendorfer is unusual in that it produces 97- and 92-key models in addition to instruments with standard 88-key keyboards.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mason & Hamlin</span> American piano manufacturer

Mason & Hamlin is a piano manufacturer based in Haverhill, Massachusetts. Founded in 1854, they also manufactured a large number of pump organs during the 19th century.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Wm. Knabe & Co.</span> US piano manufacturing company in Baltimore, Maryland

Wm. Knabe & Co. was a piano manufacturing company in Baltimore, Maryland, from the middle of the nineteenth century through the beginning of the 20th century, and continued as a division of Aeolian-American at East Rochester, New York, until 1982. The name is currently used for a line of pianos manufactured by Samick Musical Instruments.

The Baldwin Piano Company is an American piano brand. It was once the largest US-based manufacturer of keyboard instruments and was known by the slogan, "America's Favorite Piano". Since 2001, it has been a subsidiary of Gibson Brands, Inc. Baldwin ceased domestic production in December 2008, moving its piano manufacturing to China.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">HNI Corporation</span> American office furniture manufacturer

HNI Corporation is one of the largest office furniture manufacturers in the world in regard to revenues resulting from office segment sales. HNI is also the world's leading hearth products company, manufacturing and marketing gas, electric, wood and biomass burning fireplaces, inserts, stoves, facings and accessories. The company was founded in 1944 by engineer C. Maxwell Stanley, advertising executive Clem Hanson, and industrial designer H. Wood Miller. Its headquarters are in Muscatine, Iowa, with operations located in Muscatine, in various other U.S. states, and in Asia.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Hoosier cabinet</span> Type of cupboard serving as a workstation

A Hoosier cabinet or Hoosier is a type of cupboard or free-standing kitchen cabinet that also serves as a workstation. It was popular in the first few decades of the 20th century in the United States, since most houses did not have built-in kitchen cabinetry. The Hoosier Manufacturing Co. of New Castle, Indiana, was one of the earliest and largest manufacturers of this product, causing the term "Hoosier cabinet" to become a generic term for that type of furniture. By 1920, the Hoosier Manufacturing Company had sold two million cabinets.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Estey Organ</span> United States historic place

The Estey Organ Company was an organ manufacturer based in Brattleboro, Vermont, founded in 1852 by Jacob Estey. At its peak, the company was one of the world's largest organ manufacturers, employed about 700 people, and sold its high-quality items as far away as Africa, Great Britain, Australia, and New Zealand. Estey built around 500,000 to 520,000 pump organs between 1846 and 1955. Estey also produced pianos, made at the Estey Piano Company Factory in New York City.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Aeolian Company</span>

The Aeolian Company was a musical-instrument making firm whose products included player organs, pianos, sheet music, records and phonographs. Founded in 1887, it was at one point the world's largest such firm. During the mid 20th century, it surpassed Kimball to become the largest supplier of pianos in the United States, having contracts with Steinway & Sons due to its Duo-Art system of player pianos. It went out of business in 1985.

Furniture Brands International, Inc., was a Clayton, Missouri-based home furnishings company. The company began in 1911 as International Shoe Company with the merger of Roberts, Johnson & Rand Shoe Company and Peters Shoe Company. In 1966 the company changed its name to Interco as the result of diversification, and once the company exited the shoe business, adopted the name Furniture Brands International. Some of the brands it owned in the furniture industry included Broyhill, Thomasville, Drexel Heritage, Henredon, Hickory Chair, Pearson, Laneventure, and Maitland-Smith. In 2013, Furniture Brands filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy and announced plans to sell most of its divisions. New owner KPS Capital Partners announced the formation of Heritage Home Group on November 25 of that year.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Grotrian-Steinweg</span> Company

Grotrian-Steinweg, known as Grotrian in the US, is a German manufacturer of prestige pianos. The company is based in Braunschweig, Germany, commonly known as Brunswick in English. Grotrian-Steinweg makes premium grand pianos and upright pianos.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">The Cable Company</span>

The Cable Company was an American manufacturer and distributor of pianos and reed organs that operated independently from 1880 to 1936.

The Straube Piano Company (1895–1937) and its successor Straube Pianos Inc. (1937–1949) were American piano manufacturers of uprights, grands, players, and reproducing grands.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Yamaha Music London</span>

Yamaha Music London is an English musical instrument and sheet music retail store owned and operated by Yamaha Music Europe GmbH's UK branch. It is located on Soho's Wardour Street and the majority of the building has Grade II Listed status.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Starr Piano Company</span> American piano manufacturer

The Starr Piano Company was an American manufacturer of pianos from the late-1800s to the middle-1900s. Founded by James Starr, the company also made phonographs and records and was the parent company of the jazz label Gennett.

References

  1. "HNI Corporation to Acquire Kimball International".
  2. "HNI Corporation Completes Acquisition of Kimball International". HNI Corporation. Retrieved 2023-07-26.
  3. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 Palmieri, Robert; Palmieri, Margaret W.; Kipnis, Igor (2005). Encyclopedia of keyboard instruments. Vol. 3 (2 ed.). Taylor & Francis. pp. 205–207. ISBN   0-415-93796-5.
  4. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 "The Jasper Corporation". Kimball History. Kimball International. Archived from the original on September 17, 2011. Retrieved September 5, 2011.
  5. "Special Report: The 400 Best Big Companies – Consumer Durables industry". Forbes. December 21, 2006. Retrieved September 5, 2011.
  6. Harrington, Ann (March 8, 2004). "Who's Up and Who's Down How companies rank in their industries". Fortune. Retrieved September 5, 2011.