Acme Tools Celebrates 70 Years of Growth, Innovation, and Industry Leadership

Grand Forks, North Dakota - July 18th, 2018 - Acme Tools is marking the start of its seventh decade in business and its evolution from an electric motor repair company to an omnichannel premier retailer of tools and equipment.

Acme Tools is the legacy of North Dakota Entrepreneur Hall of Fame member George Kuhlman, who founded Acme Electric in Grand Forks in 1948. The second and third generations of the Kuhlman family continue to lead the company, making it the most experienced family-owned business in the tool and equipment industry.

"We celebrate our 70th anniversary by saluting and thanking our customers, vendors, and our outstanding employees," said Acme Tools President Daniel Kuhlman. "As a three-generation family-owned and operated company, we have been fortunate to have loyal customers, vendors, and employees."

Over the decades, the company's business evolved for its customers, as did its identity, first as Tool Crib of the North in 1970 and, in 2005, rebranding as Acme Tools.

Retail expansion began in 1976, and today Acme Tools has 10 retail stores in North Dakota, Minnesota, and Iowa. The brand became nationally known through its successful catalog and mail-order business, which preceded the launch of the company's first e-commerce site in 1999.

After being one of the first and most successful tool and equipment companies to launch an online business with ToolCriboftheNorth.com, which it sold to Amazon.com the same year, Acme Tools relaunched as AcmeTools.com in 2010 and grew to offer more than 50,000 products online. Today is the largest B2B e-retailer in North Dakota, according to Internet Retailer. Acme Tools built a new Distribution Center in Grand Forks in 2014 to support its fast-growing e-commerce business.

"Our success and growth over seventy years is a function of the importance we place on focusing on the customer and providing exceptional customer service," says Steve Kuhlman, vice president of corporate operations at Acme Tools. " That was my grandfather's guiding business principle when he founded Acme Electric, and it's even more relevant today in our stores and our digital platform."

Acme Tools has more than 70 years of industry experience. Today is an omnichannel premier retailer of tools and equipment with stores in Grand Forks, Bismarck, Fargo, Minot, and Williston, North Dakota; Bemidji, Duluth, and Plymouth, Minnesota, and Cedar Rapids and Des Moines, Iowa, and a leading authorized online retailer for every primary tool and equipment brand at AcmeTools.com.