Mike Dyck graduated from the University of Oregon in the late 1970s with an Education degree. In those days, which marked the early days of parking lot sweeping, TYMCO sweepers were the only ones that were well known in the market. And, they were more known as street sweepers.
His brother, Larry Dyck, was a schoolteacher at San Jose High School. In conjunction with Leonard Vella, Larry had recently started a sweeper manufacturing firm they called ‘Mr. Air Sweeper’ company. Business was good so it wasn’t long until Larry quit teaching high school and started making sweepers full time. Then, Mike came to work to help out one summer and, says Mike, “stayed for 35 years.”
Over that time, Mike became one of the most knowledgeable individuals on all aspects of the power sweeping industry. His decades of assisting contractors in dealing with their issues — which made them more profitable so they could then buy more MASCO brand sweepers — gives him a unique insight into the needs of the contract sweeping community.
Although Mike has now retired, in his retirement he founded SWEEPCO, which is a parking lot sweeping and exterior maintenance company in the Santa Cruz/San Francisco area of California. At the same time, Mike is interested in “giving back” to the industry where he had such a positive career. That spurred his acceptance to become a member of the World Sweeping Associations advisory board in March 2021.
In the works is planning for a series of webinars on topics of interest to WSA Members. if you have topics you would like to be covered in this series please let us know. You may also want to read the article in WorldSweeper.com’s History section that provides more detail about Mike’s 40+ years in the power sweeping industry, as well as view the associated hour-long Zoomcast that provides some of his reminiscences over that timeframe.