Community Leader Spotlight
Featuring Adam Schwelnus, Partner at Kruggel Lawton CPAs
Tell me about your journey to Kruggel Lawton. What brought you there?
I’m a little bit unique in that I’ve had two journeys here. My first journey was post-college. I had no idea what I wanted to do when I graduated and got connected with our HR director here. I was fortunate enough to get a position and learn what public accounting really was. After leaving, I was attracted back by the vision and responsibility to grow a group that was already here and expand our outsourced accounting and CFO services group. So, 14 years later, it’s been great to serve our businesses and clients with those services.
What key attributes have helped your success? And what do you think has helped Kruggel Lawton achieve their success?
Really, just the understanding that we’re doing accounting and taxes as a client service, and that we’ve got to be willing to go the extra mile for our clients and build strong relationships with them. Business-to-business networking and word-of-mouth truly expanded our reputation, and clients experienced and shared the level of service they received.
How has Kruggel Lawton used marketing to help the firm, and how has your marketing changed and evolved over the years during the time that you’ve been there?
Marketing is a big part of our success. Obviously, personal networking is a big thing and will continue to be so. However, over the past four to five years, we’ve increased our digital presence, with an emphasis on websites and social media, making sure we’re pushing out relevant information to reach more people. We’ve learned that geography doesn’t matter—we can do accounting or taxes remotely now. We’re getting clients and inquiries from across the nation because they saw something we shared online. That’s a pretty dramatic shift from several years ago.
So how was Kruggel Lawton different five years ago? What’s changed and how do you see it five years from now?
Well, five years ago we were probably 60% of the size we are now. We’ve entered new regions. We have an office in Knoxville, Tennessee. We’ve continued to expand into Michigan, as well as hiring remote employees in different states. We have fully remote employees in Pennsylvania, Texas, and down in Indianapolis, and I see that trend continuing. Again, it doesn’t necessarily matter where you sit—if we can get you on board with our processes and procedures, and keep our clients happy and get the work done, we’re flexible with work arrangements. You don’t have to be sitting in South Bend, Indiana to work for us.
So what’s new at Kruggel Lawton and/or what’s on the horizon?
We’ve acquired a firm called Cole Gavlas, PC in Portage, Michigan, and the acquisition becomes effective June 1st. Now that the tax season ended, we’re looking forward to onboarding 15 new staffers. We take a strategic approach to these growth opportunities; this is the first acquisition we’ve made since 2015, and we’ll continue to evaluate future opportunities as they come.
What was your first job?
My first job was actually as staff accountant at 1st Source Bank, here in South Bend!