Tribute to Van Miller

VGM Group, Inc. CEO and founder Van G. Miller died at his home Sunday, October 18, from a massive heart attack. He is survived by his longtime companion, Chris Livingston, three sons, five grandchildren and three brothers.

Miller graduated from Orange High School in 1966, then attended Ellsworth Community College and the University of Northern Iowa. He served in the U.S. Army as a medic, and was renowned for his ability to administer gentle vaccinations, suture with precision and painlessly remove splinters. It was during his military service that he developed a dislike for blind bureaucracy and structured management, which helped to shape his philosophy on running his companies.

After a series of jobs that included stints in farming, selling cemetery lots and insurance, cleaning bathrooms and delivering equipment for a now-closed medical supplier, Miller founded Miller Medical Supply, a full-line home medical equipment store, which grew into eight company stores and 20 franchise locations in eight Midwestern states. As a large purchaser of HME, Miller Medical received favorable volume discounts, and that concept would be the premise on which Miller founded VGM and Associates.

Van Miller

Miller established VGM on September 3, 1986, with the belief that quality home health care is best delivered by community-based, independent providers. Two friends, James E. Walsh Jr., and John Deery Jr., invested in the company’s start.

The original buying group for independent home medical equipment providers grew to be a diverse company of business units. Today, VGM provides HME industry services that include group purchasing, insurance, education, marketing, insurance contracting, advocacy and analysis.

Under Miller’s guidance, VGM expanded to include a presence in management of post-acute health care, golf, restaurants, orthotics and prosthetics and physical therapy. The company employs 850 people, the majority of whom work at its headquarters in Waterloo, Iowa, but VGM also maintains offices in Dade City, Florida; Atlanta; Kansas City; Phoenix; and Toronto, Ontario, Canada.

Known for his easygoing personality and ability to make everyone in his organization feel important, Miller still made phone calls to his 850-plus associates on their birthdays and work anniversaries, delivered caramel apples at Halloween and was a prominent figure in the booth at VGM’s trade shows, where he was easily spotted in the year’s latest patriotic shirt. He considered himself to be “one of the associates” and maintained an open door policy in the office.

Miller has twice headed companies that made Inc. magazine’s list of the 500 fastest growing U.S. companies, he received HomeCare magazine’s HomeCaring Award and AAHomecare recognized him as a Champion of Home Care. In 2009, Miller was inducted into the Junior Achievement of Eastern Iowa Hall of Fame. In 2014, he was named one of the Upper Midwest EY (Ernst and Young) Entrepreneurs of the Year, and that same year VGM Group Inc., was named Iowa-Nebraska ESOP Company of the Year. This year, the Des Moines Register named VGM the Top Workplace in Iowa among large companies. In 2008, Van and minority shareholders Jim Walsh and John Deery Jr., sold 100 percent of the stock of the company to its employees through an Employee Stock Option Plan, or ESOP.

The staff at HomeCare magazine and our parent company, Cahaba Media Group, offer our sincere condolences.