Innovative mower developer and founder of two successful companies Dick Tegtmeier died April 29. Tegtmeier, 74, was a co-founder of Exmark Mfg. and later started Encore Manufacturing. One of the individuals who greatly contributed to Beatrice, Neb.’s reputation as “The Lawnmower Capital of the World” due to multiple premium mower manufacturers located there, Tegtmeier started his career in the 1970s with Kees Manufacturing in Beatrice, where he developed a line of mowers. In 1983, he and several others founded Exmark Mfg., also in Beatrice. In 1988 Tegtmeier left Exmark to start yet another mower manufacturing operation in Beatrice, Encore Manufacturing. He ran that company 23 years before selling it to World Lawn Equipment in 2011.
Known for making bold business decisions, Tegtmeier told a local paper in a years-ago interview that some wondered what he was doing at the time: “When we started Exmark, people said, ‘You’re crazy.’ When we started Encore, they said, ‘You have to be a complete idiot.’” Yet Tegtmeier had the last laugh: Encore’s business grew more than 600% the first five years,requiring an expansion in 1993. Beatrice mayor Dennis Schuster noted Tegtmeier’s efforts in building the town’s manufacturing base, calling Exmark an “anchor” for the local economy.
Son Doug Tegtmeier, who was an Encore Mfg. executive, remembers his father as much more than a successful businessman: “He was the best man at my wedding, we loved to golf and he enjoyed playing with his grandson,” Doug told a local paper after his father’s death. “He just loved his community, family and friends. He taught me how to be a good man.”