With the power out, the sump pump in the basement failed. The basement began to flood with freezing rainwater. The IT manager, a guy named Mark (last name omitted for privacy), realized that if that server died, those plants wouldn’t be able to restart their assembly lines for weeks.
That’s the story of Datamax Jonesboro—not a giant corporation, but a gritty local business that survived the death of the fax machine by being willing to get very, very wet. datamax jonesboro arkansas
When the power finally returned, the plants were the first in Jonesboro to reopen. The rice mill’s owner later told a story at the Jonesboro Regional Chamber of Commerce: “Datamax didn’t just sell us a service contract. They froze in a lake for us.” That ice storm changed Datamax forever. Mark (who was promptly promoted) convinced the owners that selling physical boxes—copiers and fax machines—was a dying industry. The future was managed IT services . With the power out, the sump pump in the basement failed
However, Datamax also hosted a small, forgotten server rack in the damp basement of their old building on Caraway Road. This server handled payroll and inventory for three local manufacturing plants (including a major rice mill). That’s the story of Datamax Jonesboro—not a giant
In late January 2009, a catastrophic ice storm hit Northeast Arkansas. Jonesboro was paralyzed. Power lines snapped like twigs, trees fell on roofs, and the entire city was dark and silent for nearly two weeks. Datamax, which at the time primarily sold and serviced , saw its entire business model evaporate overnight. No power meant no office workers, and no office workers meant no broken printers to fix.
For 72 hours, Mark stayed in that freezing basement, sleeping on a stack of old printer paper boxes, keeping the battery charged by running extension cords to a diesel generator parked outside. He survived on gas station coffee and beef jerky.
Here is an interesting, and largely true, narrative regarding . The “Great Ice Storm of 2009” and the Basement Server The most legendary story in Datamax’s local lore doesn’t involve a sale or a CEO—it involves a frozen potato field and a flooded basement.