About Scott Farmer
In an August 2018 interview, Scott Farmer, then Chairman and CEO of Cintas, discussed the company's performance and the broader economy. Farmer described the U.S. economy as "in very good shape" with a "very strong" job market, noting that business owners he spoke with were having difficulty finding workers. He stated that Cintas benefits from this environment because the company needs people to wear its uniforms and use its supplies. Farmer said Cintas sources products globally and that tariffs had not significantly affected the company, though he expressed concern about their potential impact on certain customer industry segments.
Farmer highlighted the company's growth potential by stating that Cintas serves about one million business customers in the U.S. and Canada, while an estimated 16 to 18 million additional businesses do not currently use its products or services. He described this untapped market as "the great growth opportunity." Farmer also noted that Cintas is a family-founded business, with his great-grandparents having started a small laundry in Cincinnati and his father considered the company's founder. He mentioned that three family members in their early 20s—two nephews and his son—are working in the business as sales managers or sales representatives after completing the management training program.
Source: AI-verified profile updated from Scott Farmer's recent appearances.
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Transcript (18 segments)
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Interviewer0:11
Making money in this market sent us a uniform supplier and renter is hitting an all-time high this week, 35 years after their IPO. We've got Cintas chairman and CEO Scott Farmer with us now. Scott, welcome to the show. Congratulations on your anniversary.
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Scott Farmer0:23
Thank you very much. It's great to be here.
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Interviewer0:26
You know, a long time ago, and I'm sure even today, Cintas was looked at sort of as a barometer of the US economy because you provide uniforms, a bulkier business providing uniforms to other companies. So what are you seeing right now?
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Scott Farmer0:38
Well, the economy obviously is in very good shape. The job market is very strong. I think that one of the things when I talk to business people that I hear most is that they're having trouble finding people to fill the jobs that they have.
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Interviewer1:14
So it depends on the different types of items that they are, quotas, tariffs, things like that that we deal with in different parts of the world, but we source globally.
So you led me to my question, which is really why I was interested in that. Are you experiencing or do you expect to experience any sort of supply dislocation or cost increases as a result of tariffs on imported uniforms?
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Scott Farmer1:42
Well, I'd say it this way. So far, it hasn't affected us very much. We're monitoring where it's going to go from here, and my concern more than how it's going to affect our supply chain because we watch it very closely, but at this point we have not seen a big impact on our company.
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Interviewer2:15
Stock is up a lot. I mean, wow, take a look at this. Since the low, it's more than a thousand percent. It's had a great year. How do you grow from here? Do you have to wait for the economy to get even stronger, need the global economy to grow stronger, or are you trying to take market share from competitors?
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Scott Farmer2:32
Well, the really good news about our business is that we provide products and services that we think every business needs. In fact, it's hard to think of a business or an industry that doesn't need one or more of the products or services that we have. We do business today with about a million business customers across the United States and Canada, and the way we look at it, there's some 16 to 18 million more.
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Interviewer3:11
What about TV anchors? Have you thought about that?
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Scott Farmer3:15
I'm sorry, what about TV anchors?
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Interviewer3:18
Yeah, sure. Yes, we set some up. We can wear nice little matching mustard-colored plays.
I was interested to see that I believe it was your father, your grandfather, who founded the company. And I wonder, as is the case in Comcast, the parent company of this network, there's a family business in some ways, and you now are running it as a second-generation CEO of the company. How does that affect you in terms of the responsibility you feel to the business, if at all?
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Scott Farmer3:49
Well, it started a business, eventually bought the family business, merged it together. So my dad's really our founder. But it is, I'm in this laundry business. I'm a fourth-generation family member. And to me, it is sort of the roots of the family, the core. We feel a responsibility to our employee partners, to our customers, and to our shareholders. So it obviously impacts us. I think what it does though is it puts us in a situation where the culture that we've built in this company over a lot of years, and starting as a family business, when family is still involved.
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Interviewer5:10
Is there another generation of Farmers there?
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Scott Farmer5:14
There is. I have two nephews that are in the business. They're in their early 20s. My son is in the business as well, he's in his early 20s. One's a sales manager, two of them are now sales reps. They've been through our management training program, but they started at the bottom and will work their way up, and who knows how far they'll go.
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Interviewer5:36
Fantastic. Tell me about the regulatory environment now compared to when the business was started. Would it have been as easy? Could it be done today compared to the one your dad did?
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Scott Farmer5:49
Oh, you know, that's a tough question. I would say that it's a completely different environment. Today, as a public company, we have a great opportunity to access capital and do the things that we need to do to continue to grow the business as I look out into the future.
