Wilson, William H.

Bill Wilson joined Montrose Molders (www.montrosemolders.com) and its mold-making sister company, Continental Precision Corp., in 1975 and worked through school until he graduated in 1978. He then trained as a computer numerically controlled machine operator and then, upon his return to Montrose, purchased the company's first CNC machine and never looked back. 

He quickly ascended the ladder at the South Plainfield, N.J., company, becoming tool shop foreman in 1990, vice president of operations in 1999, and then president and CEO in 2005, when he purchased the company from his father, William B. Wilson, who founded the company as a mold shop in 1966.

In his four years as CEO, Bill Wilson has seen the company's sales grow from $10 million to more than $17 million. He continues to reinvest heavily in the business, including pumping $1 million in capital assets in 2009. Today the firm has little debt, runs 35 presses (ranging up to 1,000 tons in clamping force), and serves various markets, including point-of-purchase displays, office products, lawn, garden items and some medical products.