How It Started

It started as a simple google search, looking for a sugar beet factory for my layout, Ogden, UT to Pocatello, ID with strong emphasis on Cache Junction. In 2019, after the Golden Spike 150th anniversary, I found a photo of a sugar beet refinery in the valley of Cache Junction. After a two-month long search for David Carpenter AKA Bergen National Laser, he and I were able to have a long talk together. Though Bergen has not been in operation for several years, David let me know he still has many of the files for his Cache Junction buildings, as well as many other buildings across the country. He and I, both being Marines, had a solid connection from the start. David is planning a move to Sweden in the near future. The wheels of imagination started to turn, then I was informed he uses laser board (resin impregnated paper) for the building models he has made.

After a long 3-week search for the laser board, I came across Richard Shepard. Richard and I had a long phone conversation while I sat in a Dairy Queen parking lot. Two weeks later, I came home from Menard’s (a local home improvement center) and had a text from Richard. My wife, Eva, and I called Richard and his wife. Richard, looking forward to retirement, made an offer to Eva and me, to buy his business! Wow! We traveled down to their home in Missouri on March 15, 2025, and talked with them about the idea. After a long couple of months, and enduring our share of bumps along the way, as of July 1, 2025, we were able to make it happen. Phoenix Model Buildings, LLC was opened and operational on the web, Facebook, email, etc.

Richard and his wife have been able to start their retirement. With our next trip East, in September, we will be buying David’s files to add more buildings to those purchased from Richard at RSLaserKits.

We are now writing the rest of the story, and you are a big part!