In 1992 when Thomas C. Graham arrived at Armco it was the worst performing steel company in the nation. In less than two years, Graham and his team, including Mark Essig, who was then vice president of employer relations and assistant to the president, turned the company around. During the first six to nine months an all-out effort was made to down-size the company. That task successfully completed, the team turned its attention to wooing customers. Service had become so negligent under the old management that many customers had abandoned the company. Essig was promoted to vice president for sales and marketing in 1993 and turned his full attention to winning customers.
When profitability returned, it was decided to take the company public, under the name of AK Steel. Essig traveled the country with Graham and Dick Wardrop, president of the company to drum up support for the initial public offering in April 1994. The AK Steel IPO turned out to be one of the largest of the year. Between the April IPO and the subsequent October offering, the company raised over $1 billion. This was the largest infusion of capital into a steel company in the last seventy years.
Essig was promoted to his current position in 1994. As executive vice president for commercial he is responsible for sales, marketing, customer technological support, outside processing (value-added to steel after it leaves the mill, to customers specifications), MIS, asset acquisitions, and diversitures.
In two short years the company was transformed from the least to the most productive! Sales in 1993 were $1.6 billion. In 1994 they were $2 billion. AK Steel is now the most profitable integrated steel company in the USA. This remarkable run has continued through the last six quarters.
AK Steel mainly supplies the auto industry. Its large customers include GM, Ford, Chrysler, Honda, and, Toyota. The Chrysler story is especially interesting. When Chrysler was in its decline and facing potential bankruptcy, Armco Steel cut off their supply. As a result, when Chrysler turned around, it refused to buy from a company that had deserted them when they were in trouble. But last year, after considerable wooing by Essig, Chrysler was persuaded to return some of its business to AK Steel.
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