Last week, Wick Building Systems Inc., a Mazomanie-based builder of prefabricated industrial, commercial and residential structures, entered federal Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.
“After a catastrophic decline in the housing market, we recently made the hard decision to close our housing divisions. Losses in the housing industry made our balance sheet unsustainable,” said company CEO Jeff Wick. “We have determined that the Chapter 11 process provides the most orderly means to liquidate some of the Company’s assets, restructure its obligations, bring in additional investor capital, and facilitate the ongoing operations of Wick Buildings, either through a sale to a
new ownership group or reorganization of the company.”
Wick Building System operated two divisions – Wick Buildings, which focuses on the commercial and agricultural market, and Wick Buildings, which made prefabricated homes. The company is now winding down its Wick Buildings division, which has operations in Mazomanie and Marshfield.
“We have a profitable business at Wick Buildings, and we believe the combination of a strong, committed management team lead by Vice President Tom Wick, a 43-year industry veteran, great builders and loyal customers will bring our Company through a most difficult time,” said Jeff Wick. “Together with our independent builders, the Wick Buildings team creates a striking variety of award-winning building solutions, to meet the needs of its customers, who have always played a critical role in the design process.”
On Wednesday, Elkhart, Indiana-based All American Group purchased the intellectual property from Wick Buildings’ home division, which gives the Indiana company exclusive rights to Wick’s three modular home designs. Wick will also referring its network of builders to All American Group for future orders of modular homes produced with Wick’s industry leading designs.
"This is a win-win for All American and Wick’s modular home builders," said Rick Bedell, President of All American Homes, LLC. "We intend to continue offering these product lines to the Wick independent builder network, through the All American Homes modular manufacturing facilities. This will provide an immediate and uninterrupted supply of Wick designed homes to their current builder base, as well as add to production throughput for the All American manufacturing facilities."
