Bakery expands reach through new wholesale partnerships
Mixing things up on the go
June 1, 2026
NORTHEAST WISCONSIN – Third-generation President Paul Kundinger said fluidity has grown his family’s company, Kundinger, Inc., from a three-person sales operation into the full-service hydraulic and process solutions provider it stands as today.
“We try to participate in the full lifecycle of fluid power, automation and the process control space,” he said.
Paul said Kundinger, Inc. was founded 65 years ago by his grandfather, Tom A., and his business partner, Ken Miller, in Michigan.
“[Tom A.] was a merchant marine in World War II, and when he got out of the war, he was a police officer in Detroit,” he said. “I’m not sure exactly what drove him into sales…, [but] he was very outgoing, networked in his local community and probably had some friends who were in sales and drove him into that arena. He was always very entrepreneurial by nature.”
Following his retirement from the police force, Paul said Tom A. began working for an industrial sales company in the “process pipe and valve space” – starting Kundinger, Inc., when he thought he could sell similar products “better on his own.”
“The vendors we had, even back at that time, we still have some of those today,” he said. “As they’ve acquired more [companies] over the years and made their portfolio larger, it’s also helped grow our portfolio.”
Since its founding, Paul said Kundinger has both maintained long-term vendor relationships and established new ones through ongoing efforts to align its offerings with customers’ needs.
“We’ve grown… as we’ve looked to fulfill the needs of customers – going out and finding auxiliary lines and components that help fulfill needs [they] have in adjacent systems,” he said.
Beyond parts, however, Paul said Kundinger has evolved to offer design, assembly and maintenance services for any hydraulic machine.
“That whole lifecycle within the fluid power space is where we try and make sure we can be there for our customers,” he said.
Providing value at every stage
Across the Dairy State, Paul said companies are looking to Kundinger to help automate their processes in an attempt to alleviate ongoing workforce challenges.
“Over the years, it continues to be challenging to find people, [so companies are] trying to automate systems,” he said. “We are also in the electrical automation space with products that can replace hydraulics through electronics, so being very diverse has been beneficial to us.”
Paul said Kundinger’s customer base mostly consists of original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) and their end users.
“[It’s a] mix of people who are building out original equipment, and then those users – MRO (maintenance, repair and operations) type places – where they already have machines in them and they just need to keep them operating,” he said. “We’re walking into just about any business you can think of that has something moving on the inside.”
Cheese manufacturers, Paul said, are a good example of when Kundinger would serve both the OEM and end user with parts sales and maintenance services.
“Most cheese factories aren’t making their own equipment, but they’ll work with OEMs that are making equipment,” he said. “So, we would find ourselves on the OEM side, [helping to build equipment].”
Cheese manufacturing plants, Paul said, will then purchase equipment from the OEM – and if problems arise following installation, Kundinger is available for maintenance after the fact.
“Or, if they have a maintenance staff of their own and they just need some parts…, we would supply [those parts] for them,” he said.
Paul said serving both OEMs and end users helps Kundinger fulfill its promise of providing value at every stage of the hydraulics and automation lifecycle – regardless of when they’re called in to help.
“We’ll service anybody that’s using fluid power products,” he said. “Though we’re going to be most familiar with the part numbers that we use, the technology is generally the same… across the industry, so the products don’t matter. It’s a function of figuring out the system and what it takes to make it run better.”
Though Kundinger has always offered maintenance services, Paul said efforts have been formalized over time.
“Back in my grandfather’s and even my father’s day, the sales guys were probably out doing a lot of that work for customers, and as you grow, you need people to specialize in that,” he said. “We’ve just added people who are specialized, and then made it a more formalized part of our process.”
Outside of sales and service, Paul said Kundinger also has several “industrial walk-in stores” across Northeast Wisconsin – offering “24-hour immediate access to more than 30,000 mission-critical parts” for its customers.
“We do have people who pop in, but they are generally looking for fluid power automation and process control components,” he said. “If you go to our location in Green Bay, it’s all walk-in business that we transact there, or [at our] Sheboygan location.”
Because of how diverse its clientele is, Paul said no one day at Kundinger is the same – and with a publicly available inventory, the company’s “secret” is its expertise.
“We even have [an online] store we launched within the last year so customers can find it more convenient to just get on their device and go buy stuff from us,” he said. “That’s [why] we’re heavily focused on making sure we’re experts in what we do, so when a customer needs us, we’re there to help them and solve their problem.”
Proud, family-owned
Though it was founded and is still headquartered in Michigan, Paul said opportunities in the Badger State led Kundinger to open an Appleton office in 1968.
“Wisconsin [has] so much diverse industry,” he said. “We still have paper that thrives here; we have OEMs that are building paper equipment and paper converting equipment here; we have defense; we have food and beverage; we have foundries. The amount of different industries is beneficial to us because we can play in all of them.”
As Kundinger’s third-generation, Paul said he and his brothers – Mike and Tom E. – as well as his cousin, Brian Kundinger II, have a unique perspective growing up under family ownership prior to assuming their own leadership positions.
“It’s an interesting dynamic,” he said. “I got to experience what it was like for me…, see the things I maybe didn’t like about working in the family business and try to make sure it’s better for the next generation. Then, [I] see the things I really loved about it, and try to maximize those again.”
Creating intentional space between work and home, Paul said, is a necessary challenge to not only ensure the company’s health but his family’s as well.
“I’ve had tough conversations over dinner when I made a mistake working in the warehouse,” he said. “It’s trying to find that line of having that separation, because you still have to all get along together over holidays and dinners.”
Paul said before he and his brothers formally took over Kundinger’s operations, their father, Tom J., gave them opportunities to learn and lead the company.
“He let my brother Tom [E.] and I take control even before we had the titles,” he said. “[He] let us make a lot of the decisions and was back there to consult, guide and maybe pull us back a little bit when he didn’t agree with the decision we were looking to make. But he really empowered us to do our thing and shape the business to what it is today.”
Last year, Paul said Tom J. unfortunately passed away, prompting Kundinger to establish a charitable foundation to honor his lifelong passion for empowering young leaders.
“My dad was… one of the founding members of a young executives group within [the] Fluid Power Distributors Association,” he said. “So, in the spirit of that, we wanted to start a foundation where we could contribute funds to programs… [that help] educate those next-generation leaders.”
As Kundinger’s fourth generation enters the fold, Paul said he and his brothers are looking forward to helping them grow in the same ways Tom J. helped them.
“In the last couple of years, we’ve started putting our fourth generation full-time into the company,” he said. “My niece Taylor, who is [my brother] Tom’s daughter, is in human resources and marketing for us – she started full-time two years ago. Then my son, Easton, just started full-time for us last year, and he’s currently working for us in our Green Bay store.”
With the next generation of family leadership on deck, Paul said he believes Tom J. would be “very proud” of the company’s position heading into its next 65 years, and beyond.
“He really empowered us to thrive, grow in our business and take it to the level it’s at today,” he said. “We’re proud to be a family business, and intend to remain that way going forward.”
For more information on Kundinger, Inc., visit kundinger.com.
