How Did Timothy T. Tevens, President, Chief Executive Officer and a Director of Columbus McKinnon Corporation (CMCO) Create a 60% Return for His Investors in 2013? A Top Fifteen CEO Interview from the Wall Street Transcript

67 WALL STREET, New York - December 13, 2013 - The Wall Street Transcript has just published its Top 15 CEO Interviews of 2013 Report. This special feature contains expert industry commentary through in-depth interviews with successful public company CEOs. The full issue is available by calling (212) 952-7433 or via The Wall Street Transcript Online.

Topics covered: Top 15 CEO Interviews of 2013

Companies include: Columbus Mckinnon Corp. (CMCO)

In the following excerpt from the Top 15 CEO Interviews of 2013 Report, the CEO of Columbus McKinnon discusses the outlook for his company for investors:

TWST: If you would, please start by introducing our readers to the company with a brief history of Columbus McKinnon.

Mr. Tevens: This is a great company. We have been around for almost 140 years. In fact, in two years, we'll be celebrating our 140th anniversary. We actually predate steel, so this company has seen a lot of ups and downs in the general economy, as well as wars. Many of our brand names are well over 100 years old. We are known as the safe, productive and reliable company that produces lifting equipment to help major institutions and companies around the world lift heavy loads in a safe and productive way.

When people see our equipment, our hoists and rigging tools, working in industry, they continue to be duly impressed, because that's what we stand behind as an organization. We do it globally, but our roots are American. We are an American company headquartered here in Amherst, N.Y.

We started here in the States, but over the years, we have grown outside the United States as well as inside the United States. We have a wonderful market share in the U.S., clearly number one in the hoisting and lifting tool business by a fair amount. We certainly rely on the U.S. as a strong base. Outside the United States is where much of our growth is coming from at the top line.

TWST: Can you tell us a bit more about your main product lines as well as the customer verticals that you serve?

Mr. Tevens: About half of our business is the hoists category. A hoist is a piece of lifting gear. Sometimes it has an electric motor or air-powered motor on it, and sometimes it's manual power, where people actually crank a lift wheel - with a lot of gearing, by the way - to lift multiple tons. We probably operate from a fraction of a ton, maybe a quarter of a ton on the low end, so 125 pounds, all the way up to hundreds of tons, and it has various capabilities and speeds, depending upon how fast you want to lift something.

If it's integrated with a crane, and if the hoist can move laterally as well as horizontally, we do that as well, so it's literally tens of thousands of different SKUs that fill a wide variety of needs in many end-user markets. Anybody that has to lift, position or secure something that weighs a lot uses our hoists.

About 20% of our business is a thing called a lifting tool, or sometimes we call it a rigging tool. A lifting tool is a mechanical device that hangs below the hook of a hoist to grab, hold and support the work as the hoist does its lifting...

For more of this interview and many others visit the Wall Street Transcript - a unique service for investors and industry researchers - providing fresh commentary and insight through verbatim interviews with CEOs, portfolio managers and research analysts. This special issue is available by calling (212) 952-7433 or via The Wall Street Transcript Online.