Manufacturing in Northern Michigan Sees Strongest Growth in Years

Kevin Schlueter, president of PMPA member company Kalkaska Screw Products Inc.  (KSP), was featured on UpNorthLive, a news and information website covering Northern Michigan. Kalkaska Screw’s newsworthy subject: Manufacturing in Northern Michigan growing strongest in years.

“There’s a lot of great manufacturing that’s taking place in this area,” Kevin Schlueter, Kalkaska’s president and CEO, says. “Not just in the Kalkaska area, but in the greater Traverse City area, there’s some amazing manufacturing going on.”

We know there is some amazing manufacturing going on at KSP, where they ship more than 2.8 million high tech, high precision, often human safety critical parts (automotive brake, passenger restraint, and airbag parts, among others) each month. 

Kalkaska Screw Products has added almost 20 jobs this year and is looking to add ten more. An employee-owned (ESOP) company, currently KSP has 91 employees and is the top employer in Kalkaska County.

“To add that many jobs and to help out the community is something we’re really proud of,” Mr. Schlueter says. “We need more employees. We ship about 2.8 million parts per month, and so we need the right number of employees to get that work done.”

Yesterday, the ISM PMI report for August was released showing “the highest recorded New Orders Index since April 2004, when it registered 67.1 percent.”

Employment prospects for PMPA-member shops remain high, with 96 percent of responding companies expecting employment prospects to remain the same or increase throughout the next 3 months.

Thanks to Kalkaska Screw Products Inc. President Kevin Schlueter for helping get the word out that manufacturing is thriving and that we have great career opportunities in our shops for people “making things that make a difference.”

And thanks to UpNorthLive for the great story.

 

Originally posted on PMPAspeakingofprecision.com blog.