News Businessman seeks to renovate Stock’s Mill

By Jacob Beckwith Collegian Reporter

Dave Wheeler, the CEO of Mar-Vo Mineral Co., hopes to bring a rock climbing wall, a restaurant, and a mural to the former F.W. Stock and Sons Mill.

“The silos would make a great climbing wall, the largest of its kind in the country,” Wheeler said.

Wheeler also proposed the idea of a restaurant across the top of the silos. For now, he is focusing on a mural, and former City Economic Development Coordinator Mary Wolfram is working with Wheeler to secure the permit.

“Dave spent much of his summer on a boom lift sanding and priming the silos with his daughter,” Mary Wolfram said. “He really is serious about doing this for the community.”

While there is no timeline yet for the larger project, Wheeler said he has begun talking with contractors, researching the necessary permits, and making the needed repairs to the facility.

Wheeler purchased the property in 2015 for his mineral processing company “Lucky Buck,” which makes salt licks for deer. When Mar-Vo Mineral Co., Lucky Buck’s parent company, first bought the site, there were holes running five floors deep where some of the machinery used to sit, Wheeler said.

Since then, Wheeler said he has poured hundreds of thousands of dollars into renovating the mill, including $100,000 for a new freight elevator to access all five warehouse floors.

Though the Lucky Buck products can’t be sold in Michigan and are heavily regulated in 31 other states, Wheeler said the company has still seen exponential growth in demand through their exports to other parts of the country.

“We are consistently expanding at about 20% each year, and while we aren’t using the entire