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Thriving In Cody, WY: Drug business, Cody Laboratories expects to triple staff
Cody Laboratories president Ric Asherman is as surprised about his company’s growth as are his employees.
In the past year, Cody Laboratories has grown to occupy 13 times more space, manufacture seven times the number of products and employ three times more people.
By TERRA COLE
For The Gazette
"I never dreamed it would be this big already," Asherman said.
The Cody, Wyo., pharmaceutical manufacturer is moving from a 5,600-square-foot facility to the 73,000-square-foot former Wal-Mart building on Cody’s west strip by the end of the year. Production is expected to begin in the remodeled building Jan. 5.
The company also grew from producing one drug last year to seven and from eight employees to 23 in the same period.
And Asherman does not see the company hitting a plateau soon.
"We’re just getting started," he said.
He expects to nearly double his workforce and triple the amount of products the company sells by next year.
"We’re expecting to grow like wildfire," vice president Tommy Thompson said. "The only problem is that Ric sells the stuff faster than we can make it."
For now, Cody Laboratories is working on three weeks of back orders and is an estimated two years behind on requests from pharmaceutical companies to manufacture new products, Asherman said.
Cody Labs sells most of its products to generic pharmaceutical companies, and Asherman said he recently has contracted with three large companies.
"Now we’re competing with some of the largest companies in the world," he said.
When he gives his address to customers, they often ask, "What’s in Wyoming?" Asherman said he usually replies, "Well, we’re in Wyoming."
************
Cody Laboratories, Inc.,
331 33rd Street,
Cody, Wyoming 82414
************
Most manufacturers settle in large cities, which makes Asherman’s location unique. Even with the remote location, the company has not had distribution problems.
Pharmaceutical manufacturing is a new industry to Cody – and Wyoming.
"When we applied to the state for a manufacturing license, they had to write one," Thompson said.
Asherman and Thompson (who co-own the company with Glen Pickard of Scottsdale, Ariz.) applied for a Wyoming pharmaceutical manufacturing license in July 2000, following the sale of one of Asherman’s businesses.
Asherman started two businesses before Cody Laboratories. After 12 years in the Navy, he invented a dressing for chest wounds and turned his wife’s art studio in their San Antonio home into a manufacturing room. But when Texas officials informed Asherman he could not make the product in his home, he knew he could not afford high-priced buildings. So he moved to Cody, "site unseen," because it was located near mountains and Yellowstone National Park. Jackson, Wyo., was "too yuppie" for them, he said.
Manufacturing for a lone customer, the U.S. government, was not profitable enough. Asherman started a pharmaceutical wholesale business so he "didn’t have to get a night job." Through his experience in wholesaling, he decided to start manufacturing one product and enlisted the help of his retiring Navy friend, Thompson.
"I bought him a ticket to go elk hunting with me here for his retirement gift," Asherman said. "Within 20 minutes I had talked him into it."
Now both retired Navy men live in Cody.
"I love Cody," Asherman said. "We’ll be here until they put us in the ground."
After starting manufacturing and running into problems with regulations, the company hired Heidi Sanderson, a Rawlins native who worked for a large pharmaceutical company. Sanderson helped the owners satisfy regulations and documentation needed to manufacture pharmaceuticals. She was the only member of the initial staff with any pharmaceutical manufacturing experience.
Recruiting employees with experience and talent like Sanderson’s has been easy, especially with the unique, rural location of their facility.
Gene Bryan, Cody Country Chamber of Commerce executive director, hopes the company continues to recruit.
"It represents the epitome of the kinds of jobs we need in Cody as we try to diversify our economy," Bryan said.
The manufacturer hires chemistry-related positions with about 70 percent of its employees hired from Cody. They expect to hire about 20 more people next year.
In addition to adding employees, Asherman says expansion of the 73,000-square foot building is imminent.
"We’ll fill up this 16 acres and see how big we want to get after that," he said.
Copyright © The Billings Gazette, a division of Lee Enterprises.
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