Rocky Mountain Ram Serves the Memory Market.

• Author: BRONIKOWSKI, LYNN
• Position: Brief Article

What do the White House, the producers of Toy Story, the Pentagon and Pink Floyd legend David Gilmour have in common?

They're all customers of Lisa Schaeffer, founder and chief executive officer of Boulder-based Rocky Mountain Ram LLC, which manufactures and distributes computer memory.

"It is a thrill to be able to say, 'We sell to the White House,'" said Schaeffer, who will never forget the day the call came from 1600 Pennsylvania Ave.

"Someone in our office took the call and said, 'The White House is on the phone,' and we all kind of rolled our eyes and said, 'Right,'" Schaeffer recalled.

But soon the White House information technology staff convinced Rocky Mountain Ram it was upgrading and rewiring its computer system, and had gotten a referral to Schaeffer's shop.

"We do it all -- the design, acquisition and manufacturing of computer memory and hardware upgrades," said Schaeffer. "There are no hard and fast policies here; we structure our business to meet customer needs."

So when the makers of Disney's Toy Story called for advice on storing the movie's extensive graphics, Rocky Mountain Ram turned out Single Inline Memory Modules, SIMMS, for the project.

"We sell SIMMS to the stars," laughed Schaeffer. "We also sold modules to Pink Floyd rock star David Gilmour, who was producing an album."

And while clients out of Hollywood and Washington are exciting, Schaeffer finds her niche market -- Fortune 500 companies, large universities and government agencies -- just as fascinating.

"We concentrate on selling to the people who buy RAM every day and then build relationships," Schaeffer explained.

So far so good. Schaeffer founded the company in 1995 (see www.ram-it.com). That year's revenues of $500,000 skyrocketed to $12 million in 1997, and it has seen 20% growth each year since. She predicts revenue will grow to $30 million, $50 million and $80 million over the next three years.

Schaeffer credits her success with being a natural-born salesperson. She was in new home development for 10 years when the Boulder real estate market collapsed in 1988. Despite a lack of experience, she became a salesperson for a large computer RAM manufacturer.

"I figured...