Mike Gerken grew up in the Village of Columbus Grove, Ohio, a small town in Putnam County. He and his five siblings lived with his mother and stepfather. He watched his stepfather get up seven days a week to toil in the family grocery business while his mother raised six kids and helped at the store.

The third child of The Gerken Companies founder Julian Gerken, Mike began working at C.F. Gerken and Sons when he was fourteen at his mother’s insistence. In his first summer, he worked around the shop and eventually ran the loader at the Ottawa asphalt plant. The plant was 8.3 miles from home, and he traveled to and from work on his bicycle before getting his license late the following year. The physical labor—and the arduous commute—helped get him in shape for the upcoming football seasons.

Mike played baseball, football, and basketball at Columbus Grove High School. Athletics came naturally to him, and he succeeded at each sport. However, reconstructive surgery for a knee injury his senior year ended any hopes of playing sports in college.

And there was this girl.

Wendy and Mike met in high school and became casual friends. They eventually began dating and fell in love. Mike and Wendy married during their senior year when he was only seventeen.

“My parents had to provide a signed consent for me to get married, which I know was hard for Dad,” says Mike. “He wanted more for me, but little did he know that it would be one of the best things he ever did for me.”

An altered path.

After graduation, Mike enrolled at The Ohio State University, Lima. With a young family to support, he was anxious to start earning a paycheck. So, despite never having hammered a nail, he left college after three years and began working as a carpenter at his brother-in-law’s residential construction business in Columbus, Ohio.

Within six months, Mike was working for himself. Working for himself provided the real-life education that college couldn’t offer.

“I learned that if I worked harder than the next person, I would ultimately succeed,” recalls Mike. “And I practiced what my dad and stepdad taught me: to honor any commitments I make and that customers always come first.”

By honoring his commitments to customers and doing what he promised, Mike soon became the go-to finish carpenter in the subdivisions where he worked.

One evening during a vacation, Mike and his brother, Brent, had dinner with their mutual friend, Tony Rollins. After Brent left, Tony told Mike his older brother needed help running The Gerken Companies and encouraged him to come home. It meant a lot to Mike when Brent eventually asked if he had any interest. In late 1987, Mike joined Brent in the family business.

“Our daughter, Mandy, was in school, and we didn’t want to pull her out until we knew whether Gerken would work out for me,” says Mike. “So I came back by myself for the first six months.”

In his first summer, he headed a pavement repair crew on SR 20, learned to run a gravel crusher, and became an asphalt plant operator. That winter, Brent introduced him to bidding, and he became certified in asphalt mix design.

Around that time, large national companies began buying up area aggregate businesses. Julian and Brent knew that industry consolidation would give major corporations control of aggregate access and pricing, thus posing financial and operational risks to The Gerken Companies.

So, on April 1, 1989, Gerken entered the aggregate production business by purchasing The Bluffton Stone Company. Mike took charge at Bluffton Stone that day and continues serving as its president.

Bluffton Paving, Inc., also formed around that time, became a preferred paving contractor in the area. In 2023, the company received a national Quality in Construction award from NAPA for work performed on its first four-lane highway project on SR 30.

Quick to learn.

Although the family had dealt with the aggregate industry for years, they were new to operating a quarry. Mike immersed himself in learning the business by reading whatever he could find.

“I made a lot of changes that those working there thought were crazy,” he confesses.

One significant industry challenge over the years has been the “not-in-my-backyard” movement. Resistance to local quarry operations became a struggle as Gerken sought to expand its aggregate business. While the industry did a good job communicating the importance of local aggregate sources, the issue occupied much of Mike’s time at one point.

“I attended many monthly meetings to get yelled at,” he remembers. “But in the end, people in this community understand the importance of having a local source and the jobs we create.”

The Gerken Companies expanded its quarry production business by acquiring the mineral rights and assets of The France Stone Co. The resulting company, The Custar Stone Co., and its quarry in West Millgrove continue to thrive. Mike quickly acknowledges that the company’s success is due to the employees Gerken inherited and who have come on board.

“Without our employees, there would be no success,” he insists.

“Since coming to Bluffton, I have been blessed with many hardworking, loyal employees. My thanks to all, former and current, for they have made this a fantastic experience for me for the last 36 years. I don’t think I could have landed in a better place.”

Work-life balance.

When he is not working, Mike enjoys his previous pursuits. He likes watching sports (he continued playing basketball and softball well into his 40s) and woodworking (he built his current home and helped Mandy and her husband Dan remodel theirs). He and Wendy spend part of the late fall and winter months at their place in Arizona. They like side-by-side riding in the mountains in their off-road vehicle with Mandy, Dan, and their daughters Audra and Claire.

And then there is the other family business: breeding and showing llamas. Introduced to llamas by a friend (the same one, incidentally, who encouraged him to return from Columbus), Mike purchased his first llamas in 1994. The family farm has become a nationally known operation with a herd of nearly 50 llamas they raise, show, and sell to other breeders.

However, the couple’s greatest passion is for Audra and Claire, whom Mike worries are growing up too quickly. He cherishes spending time with his granddaughters, especially watching them help with the llamas and participate in their sporting activities.

Mike describes himself as an in-the-moment person who, growing up, seldom took time to look ahead to the future. He jokingly notes that it took two sets of parents to raise him. Yet, he learned from the start that you can have anything you want if you’re willing to work for it.

“While our country certainly has its flaws, there is a reason people risk their lives to come here. There is nowhere on earth that offers more freedom or opportunities than the United States.”

Job applicants often ask Mike about work-life balance in their interviews.

“I tell them in work-life balance, the word work comes first for a reason, ”he says. “You have to work to get the life you want.”

Like anyone else, Mike has asked himself, “What if” he had chosen a different career path. But in the end, he believes in making the most of a chosen career. Jumping around only keeps us at the bottom, while committing to doing our best helps us achieve our goals. And that sets an example for the following generations who, unbeknownst to us, are often watching.

“I am the perfect example of that,” he says.