Started in 1994 by my Dad, Rick Kroeker as Little Rock Drafting Services we have been working hard to adapt and grow in the ever changing world of printing.
Want to learn more about how one of the cities great entrepreneurs came to start this great family business? Well it started with a draftsman working at Golder Associates in 1994, my Dad was about to be laid off from his position due a tough local economy and a recent merger making him “redudant”…instead of accepting the layoff he asked that he could keep his desk and that Golder Associates would just pay him for chargeable time only as a contractor (at the same hourly rate none the less…). Around that same time, he had been dealing with Xerox for an in-house color photocopier for Golder, as at the time he was also on the administration team. Due to ongoing budget cuts and layoffs Golder was unwilling to pull the trigger on a photocopier lease. As a draftsman, this affected Rick’s day to day work as waiting for colored drawings for reports took many days and was quite costly.
Out of frustration one day when Rick was talking about getting the Xerox lease signed, and received another “no. He said something along the lines of “well, why don’t I just *bleeping* buy one then…” and much to his surprise the response was “Go Ahead…”
Being a true-blooded self made man, my Dad came back in the next couple days and asked Golder to confirm there permission. He asked, “so, if I lease the machine you will buy color photocopies from me, at the same rate we are paying now?
Sure enough, they agreed and Little Rock Drafting Services was soon to evolve into Little Rock Color Copies…my Dad, went from making aroud $14/hour as a draftsman to the new owner of a print company and started selling photocopies to himself from his former employer!
26 years later, that entrepreneurial spirit lives on!
