Knocking on wood.

• Author: Maley, Frank
• Position: St. Lawrence Homes Inc. - Company Profile

In some ways, Bob Ohmann never grew up. He loves his collection of old fire engines--real ones, not toys--which he bought from his hometown in New York. At 54, he still plays flag football with twenty somethings. Though he acts like a kid sometimes, he has reared his baby--Raleigh-based St. Lawrence Homes Inc.--into a runner-up for Small Business of the Year. Its annual sales grew 14% to $105 million last year, when homebuilders were helped by low interest rates but hampered by high jobless rates that kept some buyers on the sidelines. He expects 2003 sales to reach $125 million.

To survive in the construction business, of course, you have to build desirable homes. And St. Lawrence does--or, rather, its subcontractors do. On any given day, 2,500 people might be working on its projects, yet it has just 71 employees. Selling is where it distinguishes itself. Other builders leave that to developers, but St. Lawrence typically controls its own marketing and sales. It maintains and updates its model homes better than other sellers, says John DeZinno, former senior vice president of Bank of America's homebuilder division in Raleigh. "They have what we call the ooh-and-aah effect in almost every model you walk into."

Sales and marketing come easy for Ohmann. He grew up in Lyons, N.Y., and worked in his dad's movie theater, selling tickets and popcorn and cleaning up the place. As he got older, he handled marketing. His promotions even helped pack the theater for an awful science-fiction flick, The Green Slime.

Ohmann's father had been a high-school athlete and expected his sons to excel at sports. "He used to come watch me play, and he'd chew on his cigar," recalls Rich Ohmann, St. Lawrence's vice president of marketing. "If I was losing, he'd bite it in half and leave." He played tennis, and his older brother played football, basketball and baseball.

Ohmann studied marketing at Bryant & Stratton College in Buffalo, N.Y., but left school in 1970 and began...