The Pursuit of Plastic Perfection

For Plastic Molding Manufacturing, Being Made in the USA is What It’s All About

The drive to reshore manufacturing has been inching forward over the past several years. Jobs are coming back to America; 90 percent of the manufacturing jobs added to the U.S. economy in 2017 were a direct result of reshoring efforts.

And if you ask George Danis about that statistic, he’s likely to tell you that while it’s a welcome development, it was completely avoidable.

At a time when factory jobs were flooding out of the country, the CEO of Hudson, Mass-based Plastic Molding Manufacturing (PMM) resisted the lure of the cost-saving benefits that offshoring promised. Instead, he built a local firm into a major national player in the injection molding sector, keeping his core workers employed, and the quality of the company’s products at the level of excellence his customers demand.

“Obviously it's not easy,” he admitted to BOSS. “Going overseas can be an easy thing to do, but in reality, when you have to manage your supply chain from China or India or Mexico, there are overhead expenses that are hidden in the product line.”

According to the Harvard Business Review, one of the greatest concerns of manufacturing executives is the cost of overheads, ranking just behind quality and staying on schedule. Danis has carried that battle flag to victory during his half-century manufacturing career, employing a blend of common-sense leadership and a people-centric focus to grow PMM into a thriving enterprise.

Precision, Passion, and People

Established in 1968 as DAMCO, Inc., today’s PMM is riding the wave of a booming plastics injection molding market that is expected to reach $233 billion in 2023. With facilities in four states and over 200 employees, PMM is on track to hit $100 million in sales by 2023.

The firm serves its customers in the medical, industrial, defense, transportation, electronics, and consumer goods markets with state-of-the-art technology that includes 111 precision injection molding machines ranging in capacity from 24 to 500 tons, an ISO Class 8 certified clean room, and a process-driven culture of systemic quality and continual improvement.

Staying stateside is only part of Danis’s success strategy. The acquisition of Res-Tech Plastic Molding as the country was still recovering from the Great Recession was a watershed moment for PMM, kicking off a period of aggressive expansion. “We turned the company around from a total loss to a very profitable company in 9 months,” Danis recalled. “Even the bank was surprised.  2010 wasn't an easy period to finance anything.”

From 2010 to 2016, PMM acquired five plastics molding manufacturing firms, and there are other opportunities in the works. Apart from sharing reporting protocols and using a centralized supply chain, Res-Tech and the other collected companies—Northeast Mold and Plastics, True Precision Plastics, and Aucilla Plastics—operate independently, enabling each group to perform to its strengths.

As reshoring continues, and OEMs increasingly seek high-quality American made components and products, the firm’s strategy of picking up troubled companies and restoring their potential is presciently timed.

PMM consistently invests in technology and facility improvements to stay at the peak of their relevance and profitability. “A lot of people who work in the business are not reinvesting and bringing their facilities up to date, and they're not really committed. They think that's okay,” Danis mused. “With us that's the opposite.”

Danis recounted that in the early 1980s, when computerization was still out of reach for many manufacturers, he invested in desktop systems that increased efficiency to the point where his customers asked his team to design similar systems to help them reach their goals. “I've been in many other businesses including this and I'm always looking at how to perfect things,” he noted.

That dedication to innovation hasn’t lessened over time.

PMM provides state-of-the-art training in real-time on a continuous basis through its proprietary Mobile Automated Trainer (MAT). The innovative multilingual audio and visual training program ensures that PMM’s crew is among the most highly trained in the industry. MAT is an essential tool for optimizing productivity and quality control.

“It goes back to the fact that there's always a better way and we can always continuously improve. You need to live it and act upon it rather than just use the words continuous improvement,” he exhorted.

At the end of the day, caring for the people in his charge is the commitment that Danis cherishes most. “Last year when healthcare prices were going off the rails everybody was reducing their participation, but we increased it from 60 percent to 75 percent,” he reported. “You have to love what you're doing. My job is not the business part as much as it is our people. What’s most important to me is my people, because without them you have no company. Without people, you have nothing.”