Thinking back on his childhood, and growing up in a family-owned business, Mike Gemignani can only laugh at how much different things were.
"There were no vacations for us," he recalled with a laugh. "We had to work in the business."
Instead of summers at the beach, Mike and his twin brother Bob were put to work by their father, Louis, an Italian immigrant who was trying to make his way as a small business owner in America.
"I remember that clearly," Mike recalls of the early days working for his dad, which began when he and his brother were around 13. "We got paid nothing. Like $5 a day," he said with a laugh. "I learned sheetrock and Bobby learned spackling."
In trading sunburns for sweat equity, the pair picked up valuable lessons about how to run a business, starting at the ground level, watching and learning as their father navigated the ups and downs. The 1993 economic downturn, and seeing how their father handled that time, served as a blueprint for Mike and Bob when the economy crashed in 2008 as the housing market imploded.
"In one day we lost all of our business. We lost half our clients," Gemignani said of the situation in 1993. "My father had a lot of money out on the street as they say, so to collect it was not easy. But he made sure every supplier, creditor and most importantly, every employee got paid."
When history repeated itself in 2008, the brothers, who are co-owners of Louis & Sons Drywall in Long Branch, ran back the same playbook.
"We had to scale back; we got leaner and meaner to help the business survive," Gemignani said. "I remember holding a meeting with all of the employees and I made a pledge to every employee: we're not going to cut your pay, but we're going to expect more out of you and that's how we're going to survive. Instead of going cheap, we're going with customer satisfaction."
The tactic worked. Louis & Sons survived when others didn't, and employees were able to keep their jobs. In fact, Gemignani says, much of the staff is generational, just like him and his brother, with several sons following their father into the business and sticking with it.
"We just had so much respect for my father," Mike Gemignani said of the business's patriarch, who died in 2004. "He came to this country with nothing. He was a POW in the Italian army and had come to Fort Monmouth. Whatever thoughts we had about doing something else, he had different plans."
There is a pride that comes along with keeping a generational business going, or advancing one. Whether it's like what Gemignani and his brother have done, or what the team at The Butcher's Block is doing -- pivoting and expanding from a meat distributor into the restaurant business -- or what is happening at Woolley-Boglioli Funeral Home, where Bill Boglioli is handing off to his son Scott.
"Not only has he settled in, he's a terrific leader. I'm big on, someone has to be in the leadership role and he just rose into that as he settled into his role. He's kinda giving me a break," Bill Boglioli said with a laugh. "I'll say to him, 'What do you need me to do?' and he'll say 'Go play golf. I've got it, Dad'."
The industry that they work in requires a level of empathy that may not be common across most work environments, and having their family so heavily involved in the business allows both Bill and Scott to tap into that part of their personality.
"You have to be patient. It's not easy for people who are in this time, they need someone who can listen to them and work with them," Scott said.
"They need people who understand what they're going to and being mindful of that and going forward," said Bill, who operates businesses in Long Branch and Holmdel. "It's all about helping people."
Working in a family business, there is a tricky balancing act of Where does work end and life begin? and every family has a different way of walking that high-wire act.
"I think any time that you work with a family member, you're going to butt heads," Scott said. "But you know that everything is in good hands when it's a family member who is taking over for you. A person you can always trust is there."
For Bill, the secret ingredient for making the family business work has been respect. "As the first generation, you have to have respect for the next generation. "I think that you have to give them their space, let them make mistakes and coach them into a leadership role."
"We just had so much respect for my father. He came to this country with nothing"
"I'll say to him, 'What do you need me to do?' and he'll say 'Go play golf. I've got it, Dad'."