Industry & Services >> CEO Interviews >> September 27, 1999
JOHN LAUER has been the Chairman, President and Chief Executive Officer
of the Oglebay Norton Company since 1998. Oglebay Norton Company, a
Cleveland, Ohio-based company supplies essential natural resources for
industrial and commercial customers. Through its three operating
segments, Lime and Limestone, Industrial Sands, and Marine
Transportation, it serves the building materials, environmental
technologies, construction, oil and gas, ceramic, chemical glass,
electric utility, and steel industries. The company recorded revenues
from continuing operations of $239 million in 1998. Under Mr. Lauer's
leadership, Oglebay Norton doubled its size in 1998 with the
acquisitions of Global Stone Corporation, Port Inland Limestone Company,
Colorado Silica Sand, and Filler Products. Including these acquisitions,
Oglebay Norton's pro forma revenues for 1998 totaled $288 million. Mr.
Lauer is the former President and Chief Operating Officer of B.F.
Goodrich Company. He joined B.F. Goodrich in 1989 as Executive Vice
President and president of what was then its $1 billion Geon Vinyl
Division. He was elected to the Board of Directors later that year and
in 1990 was elected President and Chief Operating Officer of the B.F.
Goodrich Company. After retiring from B.F. Goodrich in 1995, Mr. Lauer
pursued personal investment interests and worked closely with Primus
Venture Partners in Cleveland and Bessemer Holdings, LP of New York in
an attempt to acquire a chemical enterprise. Earlier in his career, Mr.
Lauer headed marketing and sales for Celanese Chemical Co., served as
President of Celanese Specialty Operations and was President of Hoechst
Cleanese Engineering Resins and served on the management board for
worldwide plastics of Hoechst, A.G. Mr. Lauer, who is currently
completing an executive doctorate in management at Case Western Reserve
University's Weatherhead School of Management, holds a master's degree
in business administration from Texas A&M University at Kingsville and a
bachelor's degree in chemical engineering from the University of
Maryland at College Park. He serves on the boards of Diebold,
Incorporated, Canton, Ohio; Menasha Corporation, Neenah, Wisconsin; and
BorsodChem Rt, Kazincbarcika, Hungary. He chairs the Board of Visitors
at the University of Maryland and the Board of Trustees of the Visiting
Nurse Association of Cleveland, and serves on the Boards of the
Cleveland Opera and the Cleveland Growth Association. Profile
Norton Company , 'the company's history, products, services, customers,
those kinds of things, please.
Mr. Lauer: The
