WASHINGTON —President Barack Obama gave a shout-out to Minnesota-based Marvin Windows and Doors during his nomination acceptance speech at the Democratic National Convention on Thursday night.

During one of the speech’s rhetorical high-points, Obama listed a series of people and things that “give [him] hope about America.” One of them was:

"The family business in Warroad, Minnesota that didn’t lay off a single one of their 4,000 employees during this recession, even when their competitors shut down dozens of plants, even when it meant the owners gave up some perks and pay – because they understood their biggest asset was the community and the workers who helped build that business."

He’s referring to Marvin, a private company that cut employees’ hours and rolled back some perks during the darkest days of the recession, but didn’t lay off any of its 4,300 workers.

John Kirchner, a Marvin spokeman, released a statement after the speech, saying the company was "honored that the president took notice of our longstanding efforts to strengthen our communities as we keep our work force intact."

"As a family-owned and operated company, our philosophy is simple: Do the right thing," he said. "If we stay focused on doing the right thing for our customers, our employees and our communities, then our business will be just fine."

The company was the subject of a New York Times feature last September, which led Obama to first name-check the company in a December speech.

Certainly the company’s politics didn’t inspire the reference; nearly all of the Marvin family’s political contributions have gone to Republicans, according to campaign finance records, including $2,000 this cycle from company CEO John Marvin to Tim Pawlenty and $1,500 to Obama’s rival, Mitt Romney.  

Devin Henry can be reached at dhenry@minnpost.com. Follow him on Twitter: @dhenry