On Friday nights, after a long week of hard work and a cool breeze in the air, Bob deRochemont led his family of employees at National Vacuum to go on endless motorcycle rides throughout Alachua County.
With a twinkle in his eyes, deRochemont convinced everyone in the store to purchase motorcycles so all employees were included in a night of fun. It didn’t matter whether he had to loan his employees money to purchase them; he just wanted everyone to experience that same joy he felt while riding his Harley Davidson motorcycle.
Although deRochemont wasn't a familiar face to all Gainesville residents, the weekly messages he left behind on National Vaccum’s marquee were. DeRochemont passed away on March 31 from liver cancer. He was 86.
Even now, after Bob deRochemont’s passing, not only will the witty quotes continue to shine light onto Gainesville, but his memory will live on through his beloved community.
Not many people can say they worked for the same boss for 42 years, but 61-year-old National Vacuum manager Rick Bernal can. The day deRochemont passed, Bernal honored deRochemont’s legacy by putting up “The man behind the sign” in huge bold letters on the company’s marquee.
In his final years battling cancer, deRochemont relied on Bernal to help him run the company. They did almost everything as a team, Bernal said. Today, the business keeps up with current events so National Vacuum’s sign is relevant to the public, just like it was when the first sign was put up in 1979 about the Iran hostage crisis.
DeRochemont would stay up every night watching “The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson” just to find the perfect phrase to put up on his sign the next day.
“The sign will carry on as long as all of us [employees] can do it,” Bernal said. “I won’t tell you we’ll be as good at it as he was, but we’ll do our best.”
After graduating high school in 1956 and spending four years in the Navy, deRochemont became a boilermaker, making as little as 20 cents an hour in grueling working conditions. DeRochemont lived by a “work hard, play hard” mentality, driving him to later guide all of his employees to success.
He began his business by selling vacuums door-to-door in his hometown in New England after discovering he could make more money as a salesman while also helping people. In 1970, deRochemont came down to Gainesville to visit his sister, and never went back.
While continuing to sell vacuums throughout the city, deRochemont realized instead of knocking on doors and convincing people to buy his cleaning supplies, he could create a place where people could come to him with things he could fix. He then opened National Vacuum in 1977.
In 1983, Bernal was 19 when he first met deRochemont while trying to land a job with his company. Bernall knew deRochemont was incredibly enthusiastic about his career and clearly cared about what he could do for others’ lives. Bernal was hired shortly after.
When people come into National Vacuum, they usually walk in with a problem related to cleaning, whether it’s a vacuum malfunction or a need for a better tool, Bernal said. The employees of the store know what they sell isn’t glamorous, but as deRochemont used to say, “Dirt never stops showing up, and thank goodness for that.”
Listening to what the customer needs is what kept National Vacuum alive, Bernal said. DeRochemont believed if you lead a person to where they needed to go, they would keep coming back. After all these years, the community surrounding the company is proof of how a little bit of kindness goes a long way.
“If you were trying, he would help you to do better no matter who you were,” Bernal said. “From a waiter at a restaurant right up to anybody that he met, his character was, ‘If you want to work hard, I can help you do better by my own experience.’”
DeRochemont’s son, 65-year-old Robert deRochemont Jr., remembered his father as a man who frequently rendered service to others at no cost. DeRochemont treated others just the way he wanted to be treated, and when the time was right, he played just as hard as he worked.
One of deRochemont’s life inspirations came from a book written by Dale Carnegie called, “How to Win Friends and Influence People.” DeRochemont Jr. believed his father to be a “walking example of what that book was,” because he put other people first. Even to those who knew him very briefly, he left a lasting impression on them.
“He was generous to people without others looking,” deRochemont Jr. said. “Even some things I didn’t know about until [recently] that he did for my mom after they separated. He would say, ‘A good smile improves your face value.’”
Excellence was one of the things deRochemont valued most, and everything he did, he did it with full force, deRochemont Jr. said. Every morning, he would ride a bicycle for up to 12 miles, and even when his son decided to ride with him, deRochemont Jr. could only keep up for the first three miles.
He also loved dancing in social settings, which pushed him to open the first ballroom in North Central Florida in 2012, which is named after his late wife, Rena.
Another man who deRochemont helped succeed was 55-year-old Judd Carlisi. In 1992, Carlisi was working at a local Gainesville grocery store as a janitor. DeRochemont believed in the man’s potential and later hired him as a salesperson for National Vacuum.
As a businessman, Carlisi described him as intense, because he was “really good” at what he did. DeRochemont encouraged him to listen to the customers and frequently reminded him that “God gave us two ears and one mouth.”
“It was like watching a master at work,” Carlisi said. “It wasn’t just like ‘Look at how good I am,’ it was ‘How do I get you to this spot?’”
DeRochemont was happy to see others succeed. Carlisi said he knows for certain deRochemont impacted more people than he could ever have dreamt of.
Even though Carlisi doesn’t work for National Vacuum anymore, he has now been a sales manager for more than 30 years at a different company because of the “infectious” encouragement he received from deRochemont all those years ago.
Through the Gainesville community’s reflection and gratitude, deRochemont was more than just a salesman, he was a father figure to his son, his employees and Alachua County at large.
“He had a great life,” Rick Bernal said. “He fought a heck of a battle. We went [to] over 140 doctor’s visits together. I know he’s resting now and not fighting anymore. [For] a kid that worked on a farm at 7 years old, he was told ‘If you don’t work, you ain’t gonna eat, so you better get to work.’ And that’s what he did.”
Contact Autumn Johnstone at ajohnstone@alligator.org. Follow them on X @AutumnJ922
Autumn Johnstone is a freshman journalism/art student and a music reporter for The Avenue. When they're not writing, you can find them enjoying a nice cup of coffee at a nearby café or thrifting for vinyls. You may find their other published work in Strike magazine, Atrium magazine and Musée magazine in New York City.
