Reese to leave J.F. Cook after 5 months (3:03 p.m. 2/4/10)

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Barely more than five months after buying into J.F. Cook Co. Inc., Troy Reese said he plans to sell his stake in the Oak Creek overhead door and window company.

Reese, president of Milwaukee-based T.L. Reese Corp., partnered with Generation Growth Inc. in July to buy Cook after two of the company’s three owners retired.

Reese said he will sell his share of the company to Generation Growth, a Milwaukee-based firm that provides buyout money to companies. The deal will be complete in early March, he said.

Cory Nettles, Generation Growth managing director, said he is searching for someone to replace Reese at Cook and could have someone new on board within a month.

“This happens to be a particularly good time to be in the market for talent,” Nettles said.

Reese said he had planned to merge his company with Cook, which was established in 1947. Although Cook is a successful business, he said, the merger plan did not work out.

Nettles said that, while Reese is focusing on general contracting through his company, Cook will continue to be primarily a subcontractor.

“J.F. Cook is not a general contractor,” he said. “T.L. Reese is a general contractor, so some of the questions will be: What is your strategic focus and priority?”

Reese said he is moving T.L. Reese to a larger office in Milwaukee, and plans to add at least two new project managers to the four-person company this spring.

The firm may add more people, he said, depending on whether two projects in which he’s involved receive Wisconsin Housing and Economic Development Authority tax credits this year.