FAMILY ROLES While Jerry remains the official patriarch of the business, he’s transitioning out of the day-to-day, Summers says. “He’ll always still be involved in the business, he’ll never fully step back, I think he just doesn’t want to put out fires day to day,” he says. “We were laughing because he’s out mak -ing composted pine mulch right now,” Hundt says, motioning out their office window. Matriarch Cathy continues on as an es-sential cog of the business wheel. “She’s the glue that keeps everything running smoothly, and we don’t have much over-lap with her,” Hundt says. Hundt, the eldest sibling of three, joined the company in a sales role in 2013 and has steadily taken on more as her dad steps back. Although the family hesitates to commit to job titles, Hundt fulfills a general manager role. “Things are pretty fluid with what we cover. Everyone here has a sense of respon-sibility for making things run smoothly, so we trade hats often,” she says. Summers, the youngest sibling, who played professional hockey in Europe up until last year, is now onsite daily fulfill -ing a sales and dispatch role as well as learning yard operations and maintenance. “This is my first time being home for the off-season, to see everything that goes in for the prep for the spring. It’s been ex-citing being back, learning the ropes,” he says. “I didn’t think they did anything in winter, but apparently there’s a lot!” Middle sibling Jeff is a Hydro One forestry instructor and certified arborist, keeping forestry firmly in the family. Killaloe employs four other full-time staff and a couple seasonal workers, all of whom are like family, Summers and Hundt attest. “Our employees have been key to our success,” Hundt says. “Jason Felhaber, Ja-son Petroskie, John Limlaw are experts at keeping the machines running smoothly, and they’ve perfected making a consistent, dependable product that we’re really proud of. Richard Cybulskie, our lead driver, makes sure our material gets to market in the most efficient way, while limiting downtime on the trucks, with the help of our new recruit, Phil Coulas. We have many other drivers that we work closely with who are real pros at what they do.” SITE OPERATIONS Killaloe will process around 1,000 tractor trailer loads, or 400,000 tonnes, of mate-rial each year. Incoming fibre is sourced from local mills and loggers, often hog fuel, slabs, and low-value or culled logs. Caterpillar and John Deere loaders move material around the site, which first heads to either the Vermeer HG6000tx horizonal grinder to get larger material down to a manageable size, or the Mor-bark 1100 tub grinder that creates a con -sistent end product. A McCloskey trommel screener siz -es the material, removing large rocks or woody branches, and McCloskey stackers – an 80-foot and a 100-foot stacker – al -low for easy stockpiling of the mulch. The piles get up to 40 feet high with a 60-foot base diameter, Summers says. Colour is added – black, red or brown – using a Colorbiotics Sahara Mixer. “We were very fortunate that we had made the move to the bigger site before the pandemic because we were very well set up when everyone was stuck at home and starting landscaping projects,” Hundt says. The company lists 16 products – var-ious coloured mulches in a cedar or pine hardwood blends, some natural products, and some soil amendments. In the last few years, Killaloe has added custom, special-ty blends for commercial growers who need a soilless growing medium. “We’re working with Vineland Re -search and Innovation Centre to fine tune our soil blends,” Hundt says. “Because wood is so renewable, whereas some oth-er components in these mixes aren’t, there is more and more interest in using this re-newable resource for that use.” Hundt says working with growers is a partnership. With growing medium being a crucial and costly component of their business operation, growers need to trust that Killaloe will produce a consistent, predictable product. “They need to know that what they’re getting in their delivery is consistent through the truckload, and across the different truckloads they’ve gotten that year.” she says. “When they’re growing plants with so many natural vari-ables like sunlight, watering, seed, fertil -izer, they need to be able to trust that the Combustible Dust Specialists NFPA68 NFPA69 NFPA77 NFPA91 NFPA499 NFPA654 NFPA664 Allied brings 49 years experience to help you meet current NFPA Standards with: system design/documentation, spark detection, isolation, grounding, PLC, venting, blast path management, clean-up systems and duct audits — CWB certified and member SMACNA. Sawmill – Biomass – Boardplants – Pulp & Paper – Power Generation – Mining www.alliedblower.com Phone: 800-576-3611 Surrey,BC Vernon,BC WilliamsLake,BC Edmonton,Alberta PrinceAlbert,Sask Mobile, Alabama 50 years of Industrial Air Systems CFI_AlliedBlower_JanFeb24_MLD.indd 1 Canadian BIOMASS 2024-01-23 1:51 PM 13
Canadian Biomass Winter 2024: Page 13
