112 | Business World Magazine |
March 2014
ployed Marines” Straight says.
“But ultimately, reducing the number of
convoys – for every 50 convoys there was a
major IED incident – was saving lives. The
fewer convoys on the road resupplying fuel
the less exposure for our military to IEDs.
That’s where the real sense of price came
from. We’d never had a customer come in
and say, ‘Hey, you’re saving Marines lives.’”
Still, while the reality of the products and
the situations in which they’re used is always
apparent to the UEC employees, company
founders Rebecca and Philip Ufkes go to
great lengths tomitigate that gravity by creat-
ing a workplace atmosphere in which there’s
never a bad reason for a party or celebration.
“Their intent is that it should be fun here,
so every month there’s an event,” Straight
says.
“St. Patrick’s Day always comes to mind.
On St. Patrick’s Day, we all come together
and the whole company eats Lucky Charms
cereal. We do an Easter egg hunt in the park-
ing lot for Easter. In January, it was National
Popcorn Month. There’s chili cook-offs and
potlucks, each month there’s a major event
that the whole company participates in every
month.
“We do a summer party. We do holiday
parties. It really has a family atmosphere. And
