STURGIS — On Nov. 5, 1973, 16-year-old Eugene Yoder walked onto the shop floor at Grumman Allied Industries (now Morgan Olson) and began assembling cabs.

A few years later, in 1980, a young Sturgis native, Larry Palmer, began his career at Morgan Olson as a technician and worked his way to manufacturing.

Little did the pair know then that almost 50 years later, they would be promoted to vice president positions within the company.

Yoder has worked his way from his entry-level position to an appointed position on the Morgan Olson leadership team and the job title of vice president of operations.

Palmer now is Morgan Olson’s vice president of sales & marketing and is known by step van customers and vendors throughout North America as “the godfather of walk-in step vans.” His product knowledge and quality standards have built the foundation of Morgan Olson’s long-term trusting relationships with customers and vendors who rely on these walk-in step vans to keep America delivering.

If you've ever bought something online, there’s a good chance Yoder and Palmer were involved in building or selling that walk-in step van. The two also led the most significant and largest walk-in step van contract award in American history from the USPS.

Palmer says of Morgan Olson that if you are willing to put in the effort, the opportunities are there.

Yoder also offered up some advice.

“Keep your eye on the next level and learn that next level position while doing your current job,” he said. “You need to accept new challenges to succeed. The most challenging years of my career were implementing Lean philosophies and changing the culture from traditional manufacturing processes to accepting the changes of new technologies and processes the company has adopted for our future.”

Morgan Olson keeps growing and these iconic step vans are more in demand than ever before, officials said.

This article originally appeared on Sturgis Journal: Morgan Olson promotes Yoder and Palmer to vice president positions