Port put upstart garbage company on the map

Mike Thun said the day his crew began picking up trash and recycling in Port Washington in September 2021 marked a turning point for Harter’s Lakeside Disposal.

City residents, who had put up with poor service from Waste Management for months, greeted the crew with glee, Thun said.

“They were cheering them on, giving them thumbs up,” he said. “The guys still talk about it.”

That was a noteworthy achievement, but for a company like Harter’s Lakeside, which had only opened its doors months earlier, it was a watershed moment.

The Port contract, Thun said, put the Oostburg-based company on the map.

“That was our ‘look out, we’re coming’ moment, taking on Port,” he said.

“After that, we exploded. I often look back and say, ‘How did we do it?’”

Harter’s Lakeside has its roots in Harter’s Quick Clean Up, a company opened in 1994 by Gary Harter in La Crosse.

Harter and his daughter Naomi Schaller, along with Andy Gayhart, opened Harter’s Fox Valley in 2012 after buying Wittenberg Disposal.

Thun, who is the general manager of Harter’s Lakeside, started in the garbage business as a driver for Onyx in 2003, then became general manager for Advanced Disposal. He and Gayhart became friends in 2018 and, as Thun said he saw Advanced changing its corporate structure and philosophy, the two of them began talking about opening their own business.

When Advanced and Waste Management merged, “We knew we would have to start our company,” Thun said, adding they became serious about it in 2020.

“They (Harter’s Fox Valley) wanted to expand but they needed another owner,” Thun said. “Andy recruited me.”

He left Waste Management in March 2021, went to work for Harter’s Fox Valley and continued planning for Harter’s Lakeside.

The company started on May 8, 2021, when it bought KJ Container Services, two roll-off trucks and 80 dumpsters. Thun and one other person were the only employees, and they worked out of Thun’s house.

“We did everything, answered phones, did sales,” Thun said. “When we started, I worked out at my kitchen table.”

Among their first clients was Waste Management, which wanted Harter’s to take over some residential contract in Fond du Lac County it couldn’t handle, Thun said.

They soon moved to their current location on Holland-Lima Road, but it took some time for their facility to be built.

“This was a junkyard,” Thun said. “When we started here, I had a job trailer. I was trying to interview people in an old barn.”

By the end of June, he hired the company’s first driver, and by July they had two trucks running routes.

A month later, they started getting calls for municipalities that were having issues with Waste Management, he said.

“We really weren’t ready to handle that,” Thun said. “We didn’t have the infrastructure.”

In August, he hired the company’s fourth employee, and by October the firm signed on to handle Port Washington’s contract, along with seven other communities.

The company has experienced significant growth over the past two years, and by the end of 2023 will be servicing 23 communities and approximately 2,000 customers. Among its most recent customers is the Village of Grafton, which makes the switch on Jan. 1. Garbage and recycling carts are being delivered to residents beginning this week.

Harter’s Lakeside has 38 employees and 27 trucks, about 22 of which are on the road every day. Its service area includes all or part of Manitowoc, Calumet, Fond du Lac, Dodge, Milwaukee, Ozaukee, Sheboygan and Washington counties.

Harter’s has three basic lines of service, Thun said — residential service both through municipal contracts and direct contracts with customers, commercial services and what it calls roll-off dumpster service to heavy industrial users and home builders.

It also operates a transfer station and material recovery facility and accepts electronics, tires and similar items for a fee.

Waste collected by Harter’s Lakeside is taken to Orchard Ridge Landfill in Menomonee Falls or Ridgeview Landfill in Whitelaw, both owned by Waste Management.

The residential business “opens the doors to everything else,” Thun said, noting that it gets the company’s name out in a community that commercial customers notice.

Key to Harter’s Lakeside’s success, Thun said, is a philosophy that stresses local ownership and that contributes significantly to its success.

“We’re family owned. I live here and I work here,” Thun said, noting the company’s motto is local people serving local people. “Our money stays in the community.”

And because of that, he said, they feel a strong responsibility to the communities they serve.

“That’s why we have separate companies. Our people are here. They provide better service because they are here. When you call, you don’t get a call center. If we don’t answer, you leave a message and we call back,” he said.

“People want to talk to someone who knows how to say Ozaukee, who knows where Fredonia is. That’s important.”

And, Thun said, the company stands behind their service.

“We’re not always cheaper, but I will service you better. When we make a mistake, we will correct our mistake,” Thun said. “How you deal with that (mistakes) is what’s important.”

The business of trash, he said, isn’t particularly difficult but it is one that requires communication and consistency.

In general, Thun said, the garbage business is important but it’s a business that society often looks down on.

That’s unfortunate, he said, noting that his employees not only perform an important job but one that pays well — the average salary is between $65,000 and $95,000 with good benefits, and it’s not as physical a job as it used to be.

Thun said he only sees Harter’s Lakeside growing.

“I don’t think we’re going to stop,” he said.