Bill Stine Retires From Estes

The Estes family would like to honor Bill Stine, Estes's Vice President and General Manager. We wish him the best in his retirement from Estes. Bill has been fundamental in the transformation of Estes and is monumental in our growth, development, and success. The Estes family would like to thank Bill for his leadership and expertise and remind him that he will always be a part of the Estes Family!

"I have been involved in model rocketry all of my life since my father G. Harry Stine was one of the industry founders. I started working for Estes's sister company Centuri in 1978 and designed my first Estes product in 1979. Back in those days, R&D was located in Vern & Gleda’s old farmhouse in the grove of trees north of the woodshop (the house is gone now). I worked in Phoenix but traveled to Penrose every time a new product went into production. When I arrived at Estes in May of 2018, there were 28 employees. My immediate job was to begin rebuilding the company so it could be a stand-alone business again. The previous owners HOBBICO had been doing all the sales, marketing, and HR/payroll/benefits functions from their home office in Illinois. Another big task was to re-establish our factory relationship in China since they got hurt pretty badly financially in the HOBBICO bankruptcy. I traveled several times to China to regain their trust and get manufacturing running again. I was focused on the people, products, and the process, and now almost five years later, Estes is once again a successful business. I’ve enjoyed building and leading this team of people, so I would say my favorite moments have been about interactions with the people here. I am very pleased with our safety record and the process improvements we have made to engine manufacturing and achieving our ISO Certification. One of my absolute favorite products is the ANTAR".