EMS Manufacturing

E.M.S. Manufacturing Inc., Sherwood Oregon USA

Wholesale Lumber, Exporter and Manufacturer

The Oregonian
Washington County News

Ray Hughey
07/08/02

Wood Broker's Flexibility Serves Clients' Needs

SHERWOOD -- Fresh out of college in 1976, Ed Schulmerich set his sights on a career in international business.

He did it without having to leave home. Along the way, the 54-year-old Sherwood resident has helped make some beautiful music -- and a little history.

Schulmerich, who says the only options were grain and timber when he got out of school, became a wood broker. He runs his one-man company, EMS Manufacturing, out of his native Sherwood, buying wood from sawmills and selling it to importers and manufacturers around the world. Occasionally he acts as a manufacturer, buying wood and having it processed to meet customers' needs.

"I take financial interest in the stock," Schulmerich said. "I actually buy it and resell it. I like to stay on my own and don't like to be stuck with one particular sawmill. It gives me the flexibility to buy what I need for my customers."

He does $5.5 million to $6 million a year in sales. His specialty is clear wood -- lumber free of knots and serious imperfections. He deals in Douglas fir, western red cedar and Sitka spruce.

The Sitka spruce is favored by one of his frequent customers, Steinway & Sons, the famed piano-maker.

Steinway uses it for its sound boards. It's a very flexible wood that doesn't stifle the sound and increases the amplitude.

"Impeccable wood. The wood that goes into a piano such as a Steinway must be impeccable," Schulmerich said.

With a concert grand costing more than $90,000, "It's got to look perfect," he said. "People pay that price for it sounding good and looking good."

Schulmerich played his part in U.S. history in the late 1980s, when he supplied some of the lumber used to refit the historic USS Constitution, "Old Ironsides."

It was Douglas fir, he said. Most of the Douglas fir at that time was old-growth, and harvesting of old-growth timber was shut down due to pending court cases.

But because of the nature of the project, the U.S. Bureau of Land Management granted a special permit. It allowed him to go in and pull out timber from trees so big and old that they had fallen on their own.

"They only needed about 30,000 board feet, but they were really big trees," Schulmerich said.

So large were the trees that he had to rent a sawmill to cut them. "Each piece had to be 5-by-12 inches, with a vertical grain on the 12-inch face," he said. "They had to be 40 feet long and completely clear. No knots, no resin streaks, no nothing," he said.

The project took six months from start to finish.

Schulmerich does his globe-trotting by telephone and computer from the office he has maintained since 1997. It's on the ground floor of the old Portland Canning Co., on South Washington Street in Sherwood.

"Once a cannery, the cannery used to pack produce green beans and strawberries," he said. It went out of business in the mid-1970s. The building could be torn down in the next couple of years under a plan to revitalize the city's Old Town. Schulmerich said he would relocate, but so far he has no idea where.

By 7 a.m. most days, Schulmerich is at his desk, calling clients on the East Coast and in Europe.

"I've got to stay connected with people," he said.

Most of those connections are with customers and buyers in distant countries. Holland, Germany and Italy hold his biggest clients. He also deals with importers in Japan, Switzerland, France and Spain.

Much of his dealing is with importers who service the door and window trade in their countries, he said. They all stay in constant touch and on top of the market and issues affecting it.

A current headache is a new federal tariff imposed on lumber imported from Canada, where Schulmerich gets most of his wood.

"My U.S. customers are having a hard time now," he said. "They either have to find a source in the U.S. or pay more to get it out of Canada.

"It is important that a broker be aware of what is coming up" he said. Logging curtailments. Trade issues. Weather changes.

A harsh winter last year in Canada cut back logging earlier than normal, causing a shortage and soaring prices in January and February, he said.

But no one saw Sept. 11 coming. The terrorist attack on the United States, and its effect on the economy, caught everyone off guard.

"It had a big effect for the next three to four months," Schulmerich said. "It was very significant. Everybody just quit. There was so much uncertainty."

The markets have improved since then.

"Now people doing windows are actually doing pretty good, and it looks to continue into next year," he said. "For people dealing with structural timber, framing, business isn't so hot."