John Shearer: Schmissrauter Family’s TPC Co. Reaches Century Mark

As a company that has tried to reproduce quality packaging and printing items that look similar and consistent to clients, TPC Printing and Packaging has also attempted to become a Chattanooga area business entity that stands out on its own.

The East Ridge-based company headed by the Schmissrauter family turned 100 years old on April 19, and officials celebrated the milestone with a late March celebration and open house of a new multi-million-dollar addition next to its longtime plant at 6107 Ringgold Road.

As company president Joe “Joey” Schmissrauter III told a gathering of several dozen friends, family, colleagues, associates, and others at the time, “We are excited. My grandfather (Joe Schmissrauter Sr.) started this company in a small 20x20-foot room off Cemetery Avenue in downtown Chattanooga in April 1924. One hundred years later, we gather to celebrate this milestone event in our corporate history.”

According to a 1925 city directory, the business’ exact address was 1445 Cemetery Ave. near where the street meets Central Avenue and not far from Main Street. Friend H.T. “Harry” Robinson had encouraged the two to go into business together and initially had suggested a grocery store.

However, they decided to take advantage of the numerous hosiery and textile mills in the area and bought a $250 printing press and soon found some business labeling and tagging hosiery items.

At the time they started the business, which for its first few decades would be known as Textile Printing, they were both employed by the Atlas Paper Box Co., whose key investors were mill officials Henry Bryan and Ed McMillin. Mr. Robinson was the general manager, while Mr. Schmissrauter was a bookkeeper.

Within a few years, the growing business moved around the corner to 1330-38 Central Ave.

Joe Schmissrauter Sr. – one of several Schmissrauters living in Chattanooga in the early 20^th century -- was the son of Albert Henry and Annie Kampschafer Schmissrauter. A.H. Schmissrauter was involved in roofing, guttering and tinwork and produced warm air furnaces from his business at 618 Cherry St. That was also where Joe Schmissrauter Sr. worked until starting with Atlas Paper Box Co. a short time before starting Textile Printing.

A.H. Schmissrauter, who apparently went by Henry, had come to Chattanooga in the 1880s while in his 20s after having been born in Stuttgart, Germany. He had worked for Tom Snow roofing and heating here before going into sheet metal business for himself. He was evidently an active leader in the German society called Chattanooga Turnvereia and attended Sts. Peter and Paul Catholic Church.

At the time that what became TPC was started, the A.H. Schmissrauter family lived at a still-standing home at 1712 Willow St. in the area of town now known as Oak Grove, just south of Highland Park. Joe Schmissrauter Sr. continued living there in the early years of the company before marrying Dorothy “Dot” Beane in 1929.

His parents, who had four daughters and two sons, would later live at 1905 Kirby Ave. in Highland Park before A.H. Schmissrauter’s death in December 1940 at age 77, while Joe Schmissrauter Sr. would move to 29 Tunnel Blvd. in Brainerd with his new family. Annie Schmissrauter, Henry’s widow, later moved to Atlanta to be with a daughter and lived until 1958.

Although a printing press is known for its repetitive motion, the company, on the other hand, was regularly trying to evolve and diversify and think of different ways to do business as Joe Schmissrauter Sr. continued to head it. After Joe Schmissrauter Jr. became involved and an amicable parting occurred with the Robinsons, whose family has headed Top Flight for decades, he learned of a need for some special boxes for the large Kayser-Roth company. As a result, the firm was able to develop them.

The business continued to evolve and later changed its name to TPC Printing and Packaging to reflect its other realms of work printing and packaging in creative design, cosmetics, liquors, and consumer products like health items. Its clients over the years have included a number of well-known local, regional and national brands.

While TPC is full of its own history, so, too, is the location where it has been for more than 55 years. In 1968, the company had decided to buy the former Expressway Lanes bowling alley at 6107 Ringgold Road.

That building – with its mid-century modern architectural adornments still noticeable on the front – had been constructed beginning in early 1961 by 28-year-old freight line executive Bill Hawk Jr. At a planned 40 lanes, it was to be slightly larger than any other bowling alley in Chattanooga and was constructed at a time when bowling was evidently taking off in popularity locally.

In 1966, however, the younger Mr. Hawk and his father, Bill Hawk Sr., announced plans to buy the Holiday Bowl facility on Brainerd Road near Eastgate and consolidate their bowling operations and close the Ringgold Road facility.

Joey Schmissrauter said at the recent dedication that he remembered when the bowling alley property went on the market and was purchased by his family. “At age 11, I can still recall my grandfather standing in the vacant space next door and telling my father, ‘Joe, we will never be able to use all this space. We are going to have to sublease part of it,’” he recalled with a laugh.

It turned out the company continued growing and they did not have to sublease it. As Mr. Schmissrauter added, “Now, 56 years later, we’ve completed our third major addition to the original building. A new TPC campus includes over 200,000 square feet of production and office space.

“And the past three years, TPC has doubled in sales revenues, and we are four times the size we were in 2012,” he continued, adding that the family was flattered to learn that TPC is now ranked as the 80^th largest printing company, according to Printing Impressions magazine.

“Our fourth-generation group is committed to continuing our quest in being a national leader in innovative packing solutions for luxury brands. It is the hope of the current ownership that we can continue this meteoric growth with the addition of this new facility in which we are standing.”

Youngest brother Kurt Schmissrauter, who is also part of the operating family along with siblings Mark Schmissrauter and Hilda Murray, said later that the longtime company associates and customers have played a big part in the success, and for them they are thankful.

“Hilda, Joey, Mark and I all literally grew up in the business working summers as teenagers and later being mentored by some steady old timers that had worked alongside of my grandfather and father,” he said. “They certainly shaped us and taught us the business.”

The family legacy is continuing, as several members of the fourth generation are also now working for the company, as Joey referenced. They include Hilda’s son, Erich Murray; Joey’s son, Steven; Kurt’s children, Blaes Green and Jon; and Mark’s sons, Aaron and Matthew, who work in machinery sales for the company’s subsidiary, Interpak.

“Like us 3^rd generation siblings have experienced, there will be a host of challenges and hopefully successes as well,” Kurt added.

Also on hand for the ribbon-cutting ceremony was young Maddox Kay, a fifth-generation member of the extended Schmissrauter family and the grandson of Joey.

Hamilton County Mayor Weston Wamp and East Ridge Mayor Brian Williams, who helped TPC with the new construction investment process, also attended the dedication and saluted the company’s success and family’s contributions to the Chattanooga community.

Mayor Wamp in praising the Schmissrauter family said, “The fabric of a community is a company like TPC, and it is families like the Schmissrauters. You don’t have a community of the quality of East Ridge and Chattanooga and Hamilton County if it is not for multi-generational legacy. When companies like this grow over generations, they go from being the fabric to being pillars in the community.”

He also saluted the business for being owned by the same family for a century.

“It is just a matter of fact unfortunately that we see a company like this being sold, or it is selling real estate. To see a company like this thrive and grow says everything about you all and the Schmissrauter family.”

Mayor Williams added that TPC is a major reason why, according to him, East Ridge is a great place to live, work, and play. “I want to thank the Schmissrauters for their unwavering involvement and commitment to our community,” he said. “Their dedication and TPC’s proven track record of success will no doubt continue to thrive and flourish well into the future, leaving a lasting mark on the community and beyond.”

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Jcshearer2@comcast.net