An impression on business - plastic credit card imprinters

Nation's Business, Feb, 1987 by Peggy Moss Fielding

An Impression On Business

"I was a sales manager for a company that went bankrupt in 1970. After everything was sold I looked across the empty office, and in one corner I saw a left-behind credit card imprinter.'

Lew Hoff, 46, smiles at the memory. "For some reason I picked it up and took it home.' After years of struggle, Hoff is glad he did.

Hoff's company, Bartizan Corporation, in Yonkers, N.Y., manufacturers the machines that print your credit card data on sales slips.

Hoff and his current partner, Alan Heffman, grossed $5.5 million in sales last year, Hoff says. "That gives us about 35 percent of the credit card machine business.'

But the tale begins some 13 years ago when Hoff began working with Ed O'Reilly. "O'Reilly had this idea,' Hoff says, "that we could make imprinters quicker and for less money if we could figure out how to make the machine out of plastic instead of metal.'

They formed a partnership and worked on the idea at night in Hoff's apartment. "I lived in a studio apartment,' Hoff says. "And since O'Reilly was married, we'd get friends to come to my place to work in exchange for beer and pizza.'

But the fledgling company was always running out of money. O'Reilly got in touch with an Army buddy, Alan Heffman, who sent the partners $9,300, no questions asked.

"That kept us afloat until we could start making some money, and Heffman became a partner,' Hoff says. "We also had a supplier or two who had faith and who extended credit.'

Hoff, then in his early 30s, began seeing his former classmates moving ahead in their chosen professions. Once he waited on the table of an acquaintance who was a successful attorney.

"Is this your real job?' the lawyer asked. Hoff remembers quite clearly the sudden sting of embarrassment when he had to answer "Yes . . . but I'm working on an idea.'

After Hoff explained his idea, the acquaintance asked, "Could you sell these things to a bank?' Hoff's answer was "Yes' (banks provide the machines to merchants who honor bank cards), and the lawyer said he knew someone. He gave Hoff permission to use his name to try to make a sale. The bank ordered 50 machines.

But the partners' debts had grown to a formidable $100,000. O'Reilly wanted out. Hoff says: "I tried to convince him to stay just a little longer, but he was ready to go.' Hoff and Heffman agreed to absolve O'Reilly of any debt liability in exchange for his interest in the company.

Later, after seeking the advice of a bank employee who was using their machines, the partners had an engineer friend design a metal base for the plastic imprinter. They sold 5,000 of the new metal-bottomed imprinters to the same bank. That was their first large sale.

Then the manager of Hoff's apartment house told him to quit cutting aluminum in the apartment or get out. So another friend arranged for work space in a Long Island barn. "They slaughtered pigs right next to where we were working,' Hoff remembers.

That was the first of several moves, including one to a tumbledown factory building where Hoff slept in the back. He couldn't afford both an apartment and factory space.

For three years neither partner took a salary. Hoff continued to wait tables, and Heffman worked part-time as a movie projectionist.

Then, in 1983, after 10 determined years, Hoff and Heffman moved the factory to a 23,000-foot building where they now have more than 60 employees. Hoff says they simply outlasted their competition. "We started out bankrupt,' he says, so the only way to go was up.

Hoff reports that banks are the largest group of Bartizan customers. Others include American Express, Diner's Club and K Mart.

When he looks back, Hoff admits, "If we had done things differently, we could have done well sooner. With more capital we could have hired people who had skills we lacked. But, being a New Englander, I just couldn't stand to go into debt.'

The grandchild of Russian and Polish immigrants, Hoff says, "The business climate in the U.S.A. is encouraging, and all along the line people are willing to help out. I was fortunate to have been born in the right country.'

Hoff and his new bride, Hannah, live in a pleasant Manhattan apartment now. "But sleeping in the factory paid off, just as I always knew it would.'

Photo: Partners Lew Hoff (left center) and Alan Heffman have steered their Yonkers, N.Y., company, Bartizan Corporation, from financial disaster to prosperity, never veering from their belief in their product--a predominantly plastic credit card imprinter (bottom).