From left: Meghan DeLisi, marketing manager; Bob Rimol, president; and Karen Rimol, HR manager (Courtesy of Rimol Greenhouse Systems)
Back in the early 90s, Bob and Karen Rimol wanted to move from New Jersey to New England. Bob couldn’t find a job that appealed to him, so one night, they discussed starting a business.
Bob drafted a two-page business plan, and in short order the couple quit their jobs, sold their house, packed up their toddler and six-week-old daughter, Meghan, and moved north. “It was a little crazy at the time,” Bob Rimol says.
The decisiveness, however, paid off. Thirty-two years later, Hooksett-based Rimol Greenhouse Systems is a thriving company with 25 employees and customers in all 50 states. The Rimols were initially distributors of greenhouse supplies, but Bob realized “I could make a greenhouse better than what I’m buying” and selling.
In 1999, with the help of the Amoskeag Business Incubator in Manchester, Rimol Greenhouse Systems became a manufacturer. Meghan DeLisi, who was an infant when her parents started the company, joined the team as marketing and IT director about two years ago, and has helped continue the company’s growth.
“She’s done so much, bringing in a new perspective and fresh ideas, and really elevating the business,” Rimol says.
Prior to joining the family business, DeLisi was doing public relations for IT companies, and living in the Washington D.C. area. Now with her own children, she wanted to get back to the Granite State. Her parents let her know that her IT and marketing expertise were both needed in the family business. Since then, she has expanded the company’s marketing efforts and implemented NetSuite, an enterprise resource planning software.
“That was a big change for everyone,” she says. “Not only my parents, but other people who have been here a long time, are really open to doing things differently, changing things, and trying new things.”
While being family-owned doesn’t inform the day-to-day business operations, customers of Rimol Greenhouse Systems are often happy to learn DeLisi is the second generation. “A lot of times they’ll say ‘me too,’ or ‘this has been a family business for 100 years’,” she says. “It’s a nice point of connection when we talk to customers.”
