Growing pains? Make sure your metal fabrication supplier can grow with you.
In the business world, the quest for innovation never stops. Whether it’s groundbreaking new products, disruptive technologies, value-added services or simply a matter of supporting increased production volumes, most companies need to stay on the leading edge of innovation to support growth initiatives. Nowhere is this truer than in the manufacturing sector. Here, tier one manufacturers must continuously adapt their production capabilities to meet market demands.
But doing so often requires changes throughout the supply chain, especially in the selection of a metal fabrication supplier. Maintaining a culture of continuous growth and innovation requires partnering with the right supplier. This means one that can adapt and scale to your evolving production and/or business requirements.
At STAUB Manufacturing Solutions, we understand the importance of aligning with our customers’ growth mindsets. We’re constantly adapting our production technologies, capabilities and bandwidth to meet the needs of our manufacturing partners. Although no two metal fabrication suppliers are alike, you’ll find a few characteristics that are telltale signs of their willingness to support your growth initiatives.
Investing in new tools and capabilities
As production requirements change — such as introducing more complex assemblies or requiring shorter turn times — manufacturers need metal fabrication partners that can evolve with them. To support a new customer project, STAUB recently added a dual-station, two-robot weld cell with servo positioning and fully automated clamping.
This complex, six-foot weldment involves numerous individual flat laser-cut parts, a laser-cut tube and several machined components. The sheet metal parts are formed, weld nuts are added, and then the entire assembly is robotically welded. Then, threaded inserts are installed, sent to e-coat, loaded into custom packaging and shipped to the customer for final assembly.
Expanding infrastructure
Keeping up with a manufacturer’s growth initiatives often requires making room for increased production volumes. At STAUB, we’ve embraced this challenge as an opportunity. We recently installed an interior material and parts racking system to better support our customers’ production increases. We’ve also purchased an adjacent building to gain the additional floorspace needed to ensure future expansion in storage and/or production capabilities.
Providing engineering support
Sometimes dealing with growth can stretch the limits of a manufacturer’s current capabilities, which requires them to seek engineering expertise from their fabrication suppliers. That’s why access to engineering assistance can be a differentiating factor when partnering with a new supplier. STAUB offers a full suite of engineering services to support our manufacturing customers, including:
- Product design and feasibility assistance for quality assurance
- Forming simulation to ensure manufacturability
- Costing guidance for accurate budgeting and forecasting
Select a partner built for growth
Growing pains are an inevitable outcome of running a successful manufacturing business. But your ability to effectively adapt, scale and deal with these challenges starts by partnering with a metal fabrication supplier that’s built to support your growth — both today and in the future.
At STAUB Manufacturing, we’ve assembled the fabrication capabilities, physical infrastructure and engineering services to support your growth journey. If you’re seeking a supplier that has a long-term growth mindset, then STAUB would welcome the opportunity to explore partnership opportunities.
To learn more about our turn-key capabilities and tour our expanding facilities, please contact a member of our sales team.