Paving company awards $10 million in holiday bonuses

SIOUX FALLS, S.D. (AP) - A Sioux Falls company has awarded holiday bonuses its 120 employees likely won’t forget.

Myrl & Roy’s Paving gave its workers $10 million in bonuses ranging from $5,000 to $400,000 depending on length of employment and job duties.

One of the owners, Sue Unzelman, tells the Argus Leader they wanted to thank the employees for their hard work and loyalty.

FILE: U.S. dollar banknotes and coins are arranged for a photograph in Washington D.C., the United States, on Aug. 20, 2019. (Photo by Liu Jie/Xinhua via Getty Images)

“It’s something we really wanted to do, reward their loyalty, their stick-to-it-ness,” she added. “I can’t tell you how happy I was to see the reactions, the tears in the room.”

Unzelman and her siblings are selling the second-generation company to L.G. Everist, a rock mining company with pits and quarries in the region.

Myrl & Roy’s Paving began over five decades ago after Myrl Unzelman and Roy. Schultz left their jobs in a road construction business and bought a $500 dump truck, a rake and a shovel.

Eventually, their business grew and in 1968 they acquired their first asphalt plant.