Jim Birkemeier, Spring Green Timber Growers, Wins Indie Business Award

Jim Birkemeier is a trained forester, but "managing" his forest is the simplest part of his job. "If you just respect the forest, it knows what to do," says Birkemeier, who started Spring Green Timber Growers in the early '70s. By respecting the forest, Birkemeier, 58, has been able to make a consistent living on just 200 acres of land, located northeast of Spring Green. "No one else is making a living from their forest," he says. "We've learned how to do that."

While logging companies will go in and cut up most of a forest, Birkemeier takes the exact opposite approach. He only cuts up trees that are diseased, falling over or dead. "[Foresters] take all the good, straight trees. We had to learn how to make a living on the rejects," he says. "We've been able to make money on small trees, the crooked trees. We do things just the opposite of what a professional forester would say to do." This leaves the healthy trees to reproduce. "There's no need to plant trees," he says. "They produce a gazillion seeds every year."

The wood that Birkemeier takes from his forest ends up in one of two product lines: custom-blended hardwood flooring or smaller household items, such as cutting boards, ornaments, frames and furniture.

Birkemeier says part of his success is attributable to logging sustainably at a time when people were becoming more conscientious about where their products came from. But he's also been able to cut out the middleman by processing his own wood and selling directly to consumers. "We can take a small dead tree, cut it, saw it, and make a hundred times what our neighbors do on these trees, because we do it ourselves," he says.

Birkemeier's approach not only generates more money, but also saves a forest. "Most places in Wisconsin are being logged like crazy, and all the good logs are going to China," he laments.

As his business has grown, landowners from all over the world have enlisted his help in teaching them his secret. Last month, he was in India. "They're paying me to train people how we can take these trees that industry says are worthless and make money on them," Birkemeier says. "Everyone is sick of the big corporations ripping the forest down and not leaving anything for the local community. You can live off the forest without cutting it down." Joe Tarr

When accepting the award, Birkemeier said,
“Thanks, but my real thanks goes to Dad and Mom. They always share their family farm and forest with people from around the world and have encouraged me every day. And I thank Shawn Omlstead – my partner in creating our unique Spring Green Timber Growers retail store. Plus I have 5 more workers back in Spring Green that help make and sell beautiful and natural products from our dead and dying trees

We tried the traditional timber market back in 1974. We sold our best logs and got a totally insignificant payment. The other 100,000 timber owners in Wisconsin are still at the bottom of the Wood Chain – their only purpose is to feed the big corporations. There are about a million acres of forest within an hour’s drive of here. Right now our best walnut trees are being slaughtered in SW Wisconsin and the logs are shipped to China- exporting our resources and jobs.

I earned a forestry degree just three blocks over there in 1976. Over the years, our family re-learned forest management by doing just the opposite of what the professional foresters and government and industry told us to do – we took control of our resources and created our own timber market – making and selling high value wood products direct to customers in the Madison area, and now the world.

We harvest some of what our forest naturally gives us each year, make things to meet the local needs in our community, and export our extra wood! While the industrial trend is to use big machines and huge factories to maximize profit and minimize labor – I choose to use our dead trees to put local people to work making solid, natural, beautiful wood products. 85% of our retail sales goes to income for our local workers.

Two weeks ago I spoke at a United Nations International Conference on the Art and Joy Of Wood in Bangalore India. My message was that the American dream – that any person can change the world - is now possible every where on this planet – the American Dream has gone global. With the internet and instant communication and easy shipping and credit card payments – anyone anywhere can have a global business with no limits.

And, The most powerful force in the whole world - and the focus of our marketing- is the American Woman – the shopper. We vote for our President and representatives – but no one really believes that occasional vote makes any difference anymore – but every single time we purchase something – that is a true vote for our future that makes an immediate impact on our lives. Each purchase we make builds the company and the country the product is from. Most of us buy cheap imported stuff in the big box store – exporting our money and our jobs – then we complain and protest about the economy! Every purchase we make also builds the political force of the company we support – our choices in the store are way more important than any vote we make on election day.
We should buy as local as possible and buy from as small as possible.

Our family does buy some gasoline and electricity from the big corporations, but we heat our homes with our wood and export our wood and other ag products = we use the renewable energy every day from the sun. From our small farm - we have a positive economic balance, + energy balance, and + carbon balance – Thank you for noticing!”

For next year, the publishers of Isthmus have promised to use real wood plaques from Timber Growers instead of the normal fake wood plaques made in China they actually handed out to the winners.

The Indies Business awards are sponsored each year by Isthmus Magazine and Heartland Credit Union in Madison.