Stretch Former Improves Efficiency With Northeast Plant

USGNN.com today caught up with Charles Michie, national sales and marketing manager for Southern Stretch Forming, a metal forming company in Zelienople, Pa., near Pittsburgh. The company successfully added a third division in Zelienople last year, in addition to its locations in Denton, Texas and Modesto, Calif.

The expansion wasn't too difficult, said Michie, "we actually purchased equipment from another company located in Butler, just about 20 miles from our new location," he said.

"We made a lot of changes and improved efficiencies such as increasing the number of standard dies [for their products] and installing a 30-foot oven for annealing and tempering the metal."

Now that the new division has been operating for nearly a year, Michie says they are reaching out to more customers. "Southern Stretch has been able to better service our existing customers in the Northeast, and we've added a significant number of new customers too," he said.

He added that freight costs were also considered in the move to open the new division.

More information is available at www.southernstretch.com