Kimball International: Jasper-based company nears 50 years.

• Author: Beck, Bill
• Position: Company Profile

When Arnold F. Habig established the Jasper Corp. in his hometown in 1950, he had two ambitious goals in mind: to employ 1,000 people and to turn a profit of $1 million.

Habig achieved those goals years ago. Today, as it closes in on its 50th anniversary, Kimball International Inc. - the company that grew out of the Jasper Corp. - employs nearly 9,000 people worldwide. Some 6,300 people work for Kimball in the state of Indiana alone, and last year the company earned more than $57 million.

Habig, now in his early 90s, is retired from the company he founded, but he still stays active in Jasper business and civic affairs. Douglas Habig, Arnold's son, is chairman and CEO of Kimball International.

Arnold Habig started the company by purchasing a Jasper wood products manufacturer. In the early days, the company made wood television cabinets, serving television manufacturing plants in Bloomington, Indianapolis and Muncie.

The senior Habig believed strongly in the business principle of vertical integration. The 1950s were boom years for television manufacturers, and Habig didn't want to be at the mercy of suppliers.

In 1955, Habig bought Evansville Veneer and Lumber. A manufacturing company was formed in 1959 in Lafayette, Tennessee. The company established Indiana Hardwoods in Chandler in 1964 and built a wood manufacturing company in Dale the following year.

Arnold Habig also was leery about being too dependent upon one product. In 1959, Habig bought the Kimball Co., a Chicago manufacturer of quality pianos. Habig moved the company's manufacturing facilities to West Baden and created an electronics division to make organs under the Kimball brand name. Five years later, in 1966, Arnold Habig bought Bosendorfer, the Austrian manufacturer of some of the finest pianos in the world.

In the 1970s, Kimball International...