A Germantown, Wis. toolmaker is planning to more than double the size of its facility.
Innovation Mold & Design Inc., which currently occupies a 12,465-square-foot plant in the Germantown Industrial Park, plans to add an additional 14,444 square feet of manufacturing space and 2,500 square feet of office space. Innovation manufactures molds for automotive, consumer products and other industries.
“We're kind of busting at the seams as far as manufacturing space goes,” Innovation president Alex Hermann told Plastics News. “There's more specialty machines that we'd like to bring in-house, and we just don't have the square footage for it. Even adding workforce, it's kind of tight out there for space.”
The company doubled its sales from 2012 to 2013, Hermann said, and increased its staff from 9 to 20. The expansion will allow the company to serve its current customers better by increasing efficiency and improving timelines, while also allowing for more rush jobs and larger projects, Hermann said.
“With the capacity of the specialty machines that we want to bring in, it's going to allow us to do a larger envelope of work as well, different types,” he said.
The expansion will also accommodate more business for the medical molding industry, an area in which the company is growing.
“We invest in technology here,” Hermann said. “A lot of stuff in medical industry has to be very high-tolerance tooling, and we're accustomed to that.”
The company plans to add around 15 more jobs over the next five years as well.
Germantown's Village Board approved the planned expansion July 14. Hermann said the company hopes to break ground on the expansion in September, with an estimated 7 to 8 months of construction time to follow.