Monks turn office products into $4.5M business

Life couldn't be more apart from the world in Sparta — a quiet, wooded region known for its bicycle trails. The monks live just a few miles from Fort McCoy, a military base that trains more than 100,000 troops a year.

At the abbey, McCoy — no relation to the McCoy the military base is named after — and the other monks live together, cook their own food, and take care of the grounds. They pray eight times a day, sometimes for as long as 40 minutes, and chant in Latin. They pursue hobbies, such as painting, playing with their two dogs — Luxor, a pharaoh hound and Ludwig, a doberman. They even have a workout room, where McCoy watches James Bond movies while exercising.

They aren't bogged down too much by work on LaserMonks, which McCoy said is part of its success.

Orders for office supplies are filled by a couple of vendors and manufacturers at warehouses throughout the country. They're then sent directly to customers using LaserMonks packaging. Overhead costs are minimal and they have only a handful of employees who handle day-to-day business, such as taking the 200 orders a day. The employees also handle marketing and orders for the other ventures, such as monkegifts.com and a new site that sells coffee called benevolentblends.com.

"Our investment in inventory is zero," McCoy said. "You're able to run an enormous business."

Focus on service
The business is imbued with Cistercian hospitality, including a focus on customer service. The phone lines are answered by McCoy's soothing recorded voice that says, "Greetings and peace." Hold music is, of course, Gregorian chants. If customers fall behind on payments, the monks work with them.

The LaserMonks never lose sight of their Catholic religion. Their Web site also accepts prayer requests, with several dozen or more coming in a day. The requests are printed and stacked several inches thick on a wooden table outside the monastery's sanctuary. The monks look through them, pick a few and keep the requests with them during the day.

"People who are sick, people who need a job. A 12-year-old who wants a pony and in our own way, we offer those up to God," McCoy said. "It's kind of having a virtual way of having someone care about you."

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