Today, from four factories in Greenwood, Viking produces appliances that are sold in 80 countries. For his part, Carl is a wildly successful business oddity. As other manufacturers send production offshore, he remains convinced that only U.S. workers can achieve the level of quality he demands. Speaking with Worth features editor Douglas McWhirter, Carl discussed Viking’s relationship with its notoriously fickle clientele, the future of American manufacturing and great things that come from small towns.

Viking caters to a very affluent customer base. When you founded the company in 1984, did you satisfy an existing need or did you create your own niche market?

It was an unmet demand. Over a period of time, ranges, or stoves, had become much more lightweight and flimsy. I was building my own house at the time, and there were no big, substantial stoves on the market like there had been in the past—Chambers, O’Keefe & Merritt—big gleaming, porcelain-coated hunks of metal. The new ranges were performing just fine, but they still lacked that presence. They also lacked capacity: 30-inch ranges dominated; the ovens and the surface cooking area were limited. The only alternative to that was the commercial restaurant range. That is what caught my fancy.

But most people do not just design their own appliances.

These commercial ranges were beginning to show up in upscale homes, particularly in the homes of celebrities. There were two brands: Wolf and Garland. They were being used in residential kitchens even though commercial ranges were not designed or certified for that kind of use. They are not insulated properly. A lot of people once described them as "the furnace that cooks." Another problem with commercial ranges is that their ovens do not broil. These are strictly for roasting and baking. I realized this was not going to work, so I designed a range that takes the most desirable features from the commercial models and incorporates the convenience, safety and efficiency of a residential range. It was a hybrid that offered the best of both worlds. I thought that there had to be a market for that. That was the business concept right there.

How did you get from that concept to being such a recognizable, successful high-end brand in just a few years?

We were very fortunate. I’m a brand-conscious person. I have a marketing degree, and I know the power of a brand. It was paramount to me from day one to make the brand the essence of the company. We had to have a product to back it up and a distribution network—but the brand had to be nurtured, cared for and enhanced, and it was a constant process.

In 1988, I hired a local ad agency, and they said over and over, "It’s all about the brand, it’s all about the brand." In fact, I got sick of hearing that. Yet, when you are trying to create a highly regarded brand, it puts a lot of pressure on you. You’ve got to have all the other stuff to back it up. That has motivated us to keep our product at the level of the brand.

To establish a brand that is recognized by an affluent clientele, you have to understand your customer. Who exactly is Viking’s customer?

Someone who is high income; someone who appreciates a high-performance cooking machine; or someone who likes the appearance of our product and its presence in the kitchen. Then, there’s the value it brings. A lot of people say this is a range you can put in your will and pass along to your grandkids. This is not a disposable range.  

VIKING RANGE produced its first prototype in 1986.

How do you design your products to meet the specific needs of this clientele?

We do focus groups in spurts. We have dealers who specialize in high-end specialty products. They come into Viking on a weekly basis for training, but this is mutually beneficial, because while they are here, we pick their brains.

Do you plan to continue to focus solely on the ultrapremium market, or do you plan to offer a more affordable product line in the future?

In the future, we want to have an entirely different product line that is not quite as super-expensive as Viking. We would introduce a premium product that does not have the professional look. A lot of people can afford Viking products, but they are not into the look. We would like to give them an alternative.

Are you concerned that will diminish the cachet of owning a Viking range?

I’m not sure I should disclose a lot of this stuff, but to answer your question, yes. We are afraid of that, so we would create a whole new brand.

You operate four manufacturing plants in Greenwood. Why don’t you send your production offshore?

I hope we will never have to do that. We want to keep jobs here in the impoverished Mississippi Delta. We want an American-made product. There is nothing we can do about buying certain components, like valves, that are made in China, but I will fight long and hard to keep from outsourcing our finished product to China or any other foreign market. It needs to be here. We are a mass customization company. We don’t build anything until it is ordered by a distributor. China is not set up for that. If we wanted a boatload of 36-inch, stainless steel, six-burner ranges, they could provide them to us cheaper—though probably not as good quality. But we are not that kind of company, and I don’t envision us ever being that kind of company. As a matter of fact, that is not the kind of company I want to have anything to do with.

On the flip side, do you see China and other emerging economies as being lucrative markets for Viking?

We do. In fact, we’ve been in China on a very small scale for a couple of years. We are now seeing demand increase there. They are becoming hungry for luxury goods. We are going into a big dealership in Shanghai. We are going to take advantage of it like everybody else.

What are your leading foreign markets?

We ship to more than 80 countries. We have 16 foreign distributors. Right now our biggest foreign market is Mexico. In Europe, England and France have been strong markets. Interestingly, the Netherlands is a big market. We can’t figure out who exactly is buying our products there, but they are, in a big way.

In building your company in Greenwood, you not only founded a successful business, but you reinvigorated a dying town. Which was your primary goal?

It was to build the business. What we’ve been able to do in Greenwood just happened. It was my home, and I wasn’t going anywhere. One of my stockholders happened to have a historic building where I located my headquarters. It was on Cotton Row. I started buying the buildings next door, which had been abandoned and were falling in. That spread throughout all of downtown. I started getting real serious and said, "Hey, look what we can do with this town. If we do this on a greater scale, we can completely reinvent Greenwood." It has made a huge impact on the town. It has also been, for me, a wonderful architectural and preservation experiment.

I imagine it hasn’t hurt property values in downtown Greenwood, either.

It has raised property values significantly. That actually works against us, but that’s just the way it goes.

The high-end market is, to a certain extent, driven by the next big thing. Do you ever fear that your customer base will abandon you for the next "must-have" kitchen appliance?

That is interesting. When you study the history of the kitchen and of various cooking methods, it hasn’t changed that much since the early 1900s. Things are tweaked, advances are made—nothing earthshaking yet, other than the microwave. We will try to stay on top of any new innovative concepts. For instance, steam cooking is coming in, and we are developing a steam oven. The speed-cooking craze will probably be here for good, and we are looking at other materials and technologies. Hopefully, however, it will remain pretty much packaged in the same way. Maybe this is naïve, but we feel that the kitchen, or something very similar to what it is today, will remain for a very long time.