Since 1985, Steinwall Inc. has been a woman owned plastic injection molding company. It all started when Maureen Steinwall purchased the company from her father, the founder, Carl Steinwall. The story goes like this:

Maureen Steinwall bought the molding company from her father, Carl Steinwall, in 1987. But her professional career began much earlier, at Honeywell Inc.’s Micro Switch Division in Freeport, Ill. Asked to name her most interesting or unusual job, she said it was working on a team that developed the solid state Hall effect, which used digital technology to replace points in the ignition timing for cars. She handled market research for the team, which worked with Bosch GmbH and Ford Motor Co.

The solid state technology expanded to other applications, including ATMs and joysticks for video games. One has to withstand snow and rain. The other, pumped-up gamers.

When Honeywell offered her a promotion — running the third shift of a factory in New Mexico — she called her father for advice. He said to take the job. Since she had an accounting degree, her dad, who was looking to retire, also asked her “How do you sell a business?” Maureen said: “You sell it to your daughter!”

In a three-minute conversation, her dad agreed. “He just went, ‘Oh my God, you’d be perfect for it.’” She took a leave of absence at Honeywell to help and became vice president of Steinwall Inc. in 1983, so her father could show her the ropes. “I loved it — absolutely loved it.”

She became president in 1985, and two years later, bought the company.

When Carl sold the company to Maureen, he knew he had made one of the greatest business decisions of his career.

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