Facing challenges and problem solving is what Bob Lundin practices on a daily basis working at his company, IMED Mobility in Tea, South Dakota. In February, 2015, the IMED building, where they’ve been for the past 12 years, suffered a serious fire and had severe smoke and water damage due to an electrical surge in an unused office. Bob immediately took the steps necessary to temporarily relocate his business to rented space across the street and started working with his lender, Jeremy Keizer at Reliabank in Tea. Through a partnership of SBA 504 loan funds made available through First District Development Company and a conventional loan from Reliabank, IMED Mobility was able to move into its new and impressive building in Tea during the fall of 2016. In fact, the new building sits on the same ground where IMED’s first building once stood.
After studying business and marketing in college, Bob Lundin honed in on his real life knack for salesmanship through his first career of door-to-door sales. For the next seven years, Bob worked in various positions for an auto dealership. His last two years there Bob was tasked with starting a new commercial division that bought and sold unique vehicles such as dump trucks, cubed vans, cargo vans, wheelchair vans, and much more. It was through this experience that Bob gained the skills of marketing online. Bob learned the importance the internet plays in selling these specialized commercial vehicles. In addition, Bob’s eyes were opened to the huge need for handicap accessible vehicles. Soon after, in 2003, Bob relocated to Tea, South Dakota, and started IMED Mobility. Then, in 2006, Bob expanded his business to Roseville, Minnesota. Bob has a business partner for this location and his partner manages the store on a daily basis.
The team of Certified Mobility Consultants at IMED Mobility specialize in selling IMED’s new and pre-owned wheelchair accessible vans, which includes minivans with in-floor folding ramps and full size van conversions. IMED Mobility is a fully authorized dealer for Vantage Mobility International (VMI) and Braun, which are the only two manufacturers of handicap accessible vans in the United States that offer dealer agreements. Together, VMI and Braun represent 80% of the mobility vans sold in the U.S. In addition, IMED offers scooter and wheelchair lifts for a wide variety of vehicle types. Also, IMED sells every type of driving aid to make driving possible for its customers, as well as, several products for home use, including a variety of stairlift and elevator solutions. Furthermore, IMED offers servicing and repair on accessible vehicles from maintenance checks, oil changes, and putting on new tires to repairing lowered floor minivans, full size vans and bus conversions.
Despite being a leading provider of handicap accessible vans, what sets IMED Mobility apart from the competition is their customer service. Bob Lundin holds his team at IMED to the highest standards of quality and customer service. Bob said, “their number one thing is they take care of the customer. These people have enough stuff going on; the last thing they need is for IMED to be giving them any trouble.” IMED backs this up by having a 24 hour customer service line available.
The new building IMED is enjoying in Tea is almost 5,000 square feet with an attached 3,300 square foot shop area. This differs greatly from the previous building which was half the square footage and the shop was located separately a block and a half away. Now, at IMED in the show room, there is ample space to put their vehicles and many products on display, including showing the lifts and other products in action.
FDDC and Reliabank wish Bob Lundin and the entire IMED team continued success while facing challenges with their customers and problem solving to come up with solutions to make their lives better and hopefully to gain or regain a bit of independence.
Below: Bob Lundin in the showroom of the newly constructed IMED Mobility building in Tea, SD
