What happened to Quincy Maid Potato Chip company located in Quincy Il?

Answer 1

My father worked for this company from the 1960s until around 2000 as a delivery driver. He was there pretty much the whole lifecycle of the company. It was owned by the Ostermueller family, specifically George Ostermueller, for most of this time. His son, Jim, didn't ever seem to have much interest in this goldmine that bought his Porsche, and eventually after his father's death (late 90s maybe), he ran it briefly and sold it to a few partners. It was down to three drivers when my dad retired from there. It went under around 2000. The building is still there but little else remains of this long time company.

Answer 2

Snack Maker Looks To Expand With Homemade Potato Chips.

Quincy Ill. (AP) – The 56 year-old Quincy Potato Chip Inc. is trying to increase its share in the highly competive snack-food market by emphasizing its handmade chips.

New blood and new ideas enabled the company, maker of Quincy Maid chips to expand its operation and buy out another chip maker in 1994, only a year after the company was in bankruptcy.

Quincy Potato Chip is owned by the House family of Payson. Since November, the Houses also have distributed Country Cooked potato Chips after buying out the Baring, Mo., company. Grant House , Quincy Potato Chip’s general manager, said Country Cooked chips are handmade and fried in peanut oil, giving them a distinctive flavor. House said he hopes to use the special cooking style to explore larger markets for the company. “We’re trying to find a niche for handmade, peanut-oil, no-cholesterol chip, because when you get into the big cities none of the chips are handmade,” he said.

Quincy Potato Chip began to turn around after Grant’s father, Chuck, and another Payson man, Harold Schmidt, bought the company from a bankruptcy receiver in late 1993.

Since then, the company has gone from seven employees to 16 full and part-time workers. “It’s been a home-owned company for 50 years, and we wanted to keep it that way,” Chuck House said at the time of the purchase in 1993.

The company was founded in 1939 by George Ostermueller. Ostermueller personally oversaw Quincy Potato Chip’s operation until his death in May 1992 at age 86.

Although business has improved substantially during the past year, Grant House said the company is operating at about one-third of its capacity, producing about 4,500 bags a day.