R.L. Reppert CEO, Rick Reppert, Sr. won the Lehigh Valley Business's ICON Award.

Lehigh Valley Business honored him with the following write up:

Believe it or not, a home construction project he helped with as a teenager was the spark that led Rick Reppert, Sr., to start his own contracting business.

"When I was 14 I helped my father convert a large space into smaller rooms and I was pretty amazed at how after the framing is done and how you drywall the walls and you create two different spaces or multiple spaces," recalls Reppert who launched commercial wall and ceiling contractor R.L. Reppert Inc. nearly half a century ago. "That was my introduction to it and then I started this company when I was 18 years old, soon after getting married and having our first child. I need a job, and I saw an ad in the paper for drywall hangers."

Reppert landed that job and worked for a short period. He got pretty good at what he was doing, so he decided to open up his own contracting business. "I always knew I would be in the construction business," says Reppert, whose father was a painter. "He was the preferred painter and wall covering person for Max Hess. He would always call my father to do work on his house."

R.L. Reppert primarily works for commercial general contractors in eastern Pennsylvania--some of which have been clients for 20 or 30 years--and has done more than 5,000 buildings, according to Reppert. The business employs 70-80 people.

Today, Reppert's four children are running the business, and Reppert, who describes himself as "semi-retired," says he isn't sure he will ever completely call it quits. "I still go into the office and do what I can and help them wherever I can. Starting the business at 18, I don't know that I can ever do that (retire). We will see how things develop."