ALL IN THE FAMILY

Bonnie Miller is president of Day Transfer Co. at 2094 Southern Expressway.

When new truck drivers pull into Day Transfer Co. in Cape Girardeau they often do a double-take when they ask for the warehouseman.

"That's me," replies Connie Nebel.

Nebel, daughter of Bonnie Miller, president of the transfer company at 2094 Southern Expressway, has been involved in the business more than 11 years.

Miller also raises some eyebrows when she attends national conventions, where she says the norm is 100 men and two or three women.

Miller also takes an occasional turn at helping load and unload merchandise at the warehouse. She has been involved with the business a number of years and became its president in 1985.

"Women have been involved in Day Transfer a long time," said Miller. "My mother helped my dad. And when I retire, Connie will remain involved in the business."

Day Transfer has been around the Cape Girardeau scene for more than 80 years. The company was founded by William A. Day in 1914 when the truck-driving Day realized a need for a small storage and trucking company.

"My grandfather originally hauled groceries from Cape Girardeau to Sikeston," said Miller. Soon, people were asking him to deliver other goods, either from Cape to Sikeston, or vice versa.

The first Day Transfer Co. was founded in the 1100 block of Independence and expanded to 1545 Independence in 1947.

The latest move occurred in 1989, when the company moved to its 12,000-square-foot present site in a building designed by Mrs. Miller, who has been operating the business more than two decades.

Day Transfer is still a family business, with Miller, Connie and a son-in-law, Mike Crawford, who also works in the business.

All are familiar with the operation, which offers storage, packing and moving services to all points of the country, including Alaska and Hawaii and to foreign countries.

"We're affiliated with Wheaton Van Lines," said Miller. "We have a number of our own trucks here which can cover moves to 28 states. With Wheaton, we can send freight everywhere."

The moving business is not an 8 to 5 job," said Miller. "Being president of a trucking and storage company is not a glamorous job. I don't sit behind a desk. If the need arises, I'll be in the back loading and unloading, or helping pack."

And it's not unusual to see Connie working a high-lift. "I haven't dropped a crate yet," Nebel noted.

Miller is one of more than 225,000 women in the nation who own transportation and communications companies.

Today, women own more than one-third of all U.S. businesses, including construction, transportation, manufacturing and agricultural companies, an increase of 78 percent during the past decade.

That translates into 7.9 million women-owned companies over the 4.5 million companies of 1997.

The National Foundation for Women Business Owners, headquartered in Washington, noted in a recent report that women-owned companies employ 26 percent of the nation's work force.

At the same time, women-owned businesses saw sales jump 236 percent, from $681 billion in 1987 to $3.28 trillion in 1996.

The report, "1996 Facts on Women-Owned Businesses," was based on new data from the Census Bureau, which closely parallels those of a foundation study during the early 1990s.

"Women-owned businesses continue to significantly boost the nation's economy," said LaVerne Johnson, of the U.S. Small Business Administration's St. Louis office. ""Women-owned businesses employ more than 18 million people throughout the nation.

During fiscal 1995, the SBA's St. Louis district guaranteed 174 loans for women-owned businesses in Eastern Missouri, providing $16 million in financing to start and expand existing businesses, said Johnson.

Bruce Kent, regional administrator of the U.S. Small Business Administration agrees that women-owned businesses play a vital role in preparing America to move ahead into the 21st century.

"Between 1993 and 1994, SBA loans to women-owned business increased 85 percent," said Kent. "Between FY 1994 and 1995, these loans increased another 85 percent." During the FY 94-95 year, women entrepreneurs received loans totaling $1.3 billion, or 24 percent of SBA's total loan volume.

"These are impressive numbers," said Kent. "They document the strength of our loan programs and the increasing importance of women-owned business to the lending community."

Women-owned businesses in Missouri for 1996 are almost triple the 54,000 reported in the state a decade ago. That figure jumped to 87,600 in 1987, and has increased to more than 155,000 this year.

Illinois ranked among the top 10 states with women-owned businesses. The state's 337,000 women-owned businesses is a 75 percent increase from 1987.

California has the largest number of women-owned businesses, with more than 1 million. Texas is second, with 552,000; New York third, with 527,000; and Florida fourth with 497,000.

The large share of women-owned companies -- 52 percent -- is in the service sector, according to the report. Nineteen percent was in retail trade and 10 percent in financial, insurance or real estate.

Major advances have been reported in the number of women-owned construction companies, which now total 324,000; wholesale trade sector, 293,000; transportation and communications, 225,000; agriculture, 118,000; and manufacturing, 251,000.

There are many women-owned businesses in the Cape Girardeau area, ranging from services, retail, real estate and construction.