40 Years Strong!

Before there was Google or Netflix; before there was Facebook, Twitter or Instagram; before iPhones, texting, FaceTime and selfies; even before Chicken McNuggets, 4M was cleaning buildings. Hard to believe, isn’t it, especially when less than one-third of family businesses survive the transition from first to second generation? For 40 years, 4M has never wavered on its pathway to success.

From its humble beginnings in 1978, serving just three customers in St. Louis, 4M has grown exponentially adding customers in 14 states and producing more than $70M in revenue annually. And although benchmarking revenue growth is indeed indicative of its success, the real testament to 4M’s longevity is its people.

An old African proverb states: “If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together.”  An organization is only as good as the people it employs, those who give their all every day, coming to work with energy, enthusiasm and excitement; who don’t just work for a paycheck but who share a company’s vision and goals. At 4M, we are proud and honored to employ nearly 3,000 Team Members in part-time and full-time positions. These professionals dedicate themselves to making our customers happy by cleaning more than 95 million square feet of office, industrial, manufacturing, health care and educational space every day.

We don’t believe in luck; we believe in working together to achieve our common goal of always being the absolute best building solutions partner, especially in a tight labor market when workers demand higher wages. We have built our business on the promise to always listen to our customers, understand their needs and deliver unparalleled cleaning solutions and service and to show respect to our Team Members who are responsible for our success.

To that end, we have taken innovative approaches over the years which have improved the quality of our service and differentiated us among our competitors, such as CleanPath®, a proprietary, lean-engineering workflow strategy that eliminates waste in our cleaning process. We have also made our Team Members’ and customers’ safety a top priority at 4M. Our industry associates have dubbed us one of the safest janitorial companies in the world. We appreciate their faith in us and plan to live up to their expectations.

40 years ago, founder Mitch Murch saw a need in the janitorial industry, and he took a chance with the hope and belief that his cleaning company could be the best in the business, rivaling the industry’s leaders and end up on top. Tapping his oldest son Tim, then a college student, to join him for the ride, Mitch set about building exactly what he had envisioned. Soon Mitch Murch Maintenance Management became known as “The Quality Contract Cleaner” and grew to be the largest janitorial contractor in St. Louis.

Mitch’s dream lives on in Tim, the new CEO, who is creating his own legacy, rebranding his dad’s company as 4M Building Solutions in 2014, but with his eye always focused on fostering a company whose culture is unmatched, whose talented Team Members are truly valued and whose customers are number one.

“Our success comes from the core values my dad started the company with back in 1978: customer intimacy, integrity, teamwork and innovation,” says Tim. “These values were all defined by Mitch. That is a special legacy that will live forever.”

We are extremely blessed and very grateful for the Team Members who have been with us over the past 40 years and of course for the customers we serve and have been privileged to serve throughout our history. In fact, our first very customer, the Pierre Laclede Center in St. Louis, is still with us! Thank you to everyone who has made and continues to make 4M the very best it can be, a shining star which continues to burn bright. As Eleanor Roosevelt said, “The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams.” For Mitch, Tim and for all of the 4M family, those dreams continue to come true every single day.