PMC Inc.: PMC diversifies but keeps success formula confidential.

PMC Inc. PMC diversifies but keeps success formula confidential

Lodged in a remote industrial corner of the San Fernando Valley - in a neighborhood of auto body shops and garages - is the nondescript headquarters of PMC Inc.

Los Angeles County's largest supplier of paint, varnish and similar products has remained a private company for 25 years, making revenues of $675 million in 1988. And it prefers to remain very, very private.

"In our business, it's very competitive," said Philip Kamins, the company's founder. "The more information we give out, the more our competitors get."

Kamins noted that he expects 1989 sales to exceed $1 billion. But he won't reveal his secret to success.

PMC, parent of two other companies, is actually involved in a number of businesses - from paint and varnish to plastics and medical goods.

Its products include dyes, polyurethane foam, fiberglass products, textiles, irrigation equipment and instruments for the military.

This multi-divisioned company began as a plastics scrap yard in 1964. Kamins, 53, had started his career at a scrap yard at age 16, while attending night school for his college degree. Then he decided to strike out on his own.

Along with his wife and brother-in-law, he opened another plastics scrap yard, Kamco Plastics. The company grew by acquiring chemical and machinery businesses.

He changed its name to PMC - short for Plastic Management Corp. - and it now employs over 3,400 people in 63 offices.

Much of PMC's manufacturing takes place in New Jersey, but there are operations in Arkansas, the Carolinas, Georgia, Indiana, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Maryland, Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Washington.

Although Kamins is concerned about competition, the company is very diverse.

One subsidiary, Package Service Corp. of Kentucky, has eight divisions, two of which manufacture and market medical products. A Morristown, Pa., division manufacturers neurosurgical devices. Another, DermaCare, makes skin marking pens and foam bed pads, among other things.

PMC's other subsidiary, Hilton Davis Co. of Cincinnati manufacturers asprin, textiles, food dye and printing ink.

And if that's not diverse enough, PMC has divisions devoted to service.

And environmental consulting division, Veritech, was founded two years ago in Butler, N.J. It provides environmental monitoring services, investigations and other analytical services for companies.

Another division is a full-service machine shop; it repairs machine parts and designs large custome equipment for clients.

PMC recently purchased a chemical importer based in Toronto, Canada, Kingsley & Keith (Canada) Inc., a 35-year-old company, offers specialty chemicals and has regional sales offices across Canada.

PMC began expanding globally in 1982, when it opened an acetate flake shop in Tubize, Belgium. Three years later, it opened a nylon polymer manufacturing plant in the same city.

PMC also purchased a urethane foam-dispensing equipment manufacturer in West Germany. This division covers the European, Near East and African markets.

PMC, now established in the international marketplace, need not worry so much about competitors.

If it realizes $1 billion in sales for 1989, as predicted by Kamins, revenues will have almost doubled in one year.

PHOTO : Hideaway: PMC prefers privacy