Manufacturing Transformed: Real Shops, Real Stories

How does a 38-person aerospace shop process thousands of work orders a year without letting paperwork, handoffs, and daily firefighting take over? I sat down with Hunter Russell of Low Country Aerospace to unpack the systems behind their remarkable growth.  With roughly a dozen CNC machines, waterjets, routers, and a press brake, the team is on track to process nearly 12,000 work orders this year,...

In this episode of  Manufacturing Transformed , I sat down with Brock Graves from Quick Drive Racing, a small family-owned business building incredibly high-end drivetrain components for serious horsepower. We're talking drag racing, monster trucks, and applications designed to handle 3,000+ horsepower. As a lifelong motorhead, this was a really fun one for me. What I loved about this conversation...

I've been looking forward to this conversation for a long time. Roush Yates Manufacturing Solutions has been a ProShop customer since late 2018, and in a lot of ways, our two companies have grown up together. When we first started working with them, RYMS was a 35-person manufacturing operation tied closely to the legendary Roush Yates Engines business, known for building high-performance Ford NASC...

Every once in a while, I record an episode that sticks with me long after the microphones are turned off. This was one of those conversations. I sat down with Alex Mazerolle from Archer Precision expecting to talk about ERP systems, process control, and shop management. Instead, we ended up unpacking something much bigger: what it really looks like to build a modern machine shop around clarity, ac...

What happens when you leave a stable career, bet on yourself, and commit to building a shop the right way  from day one? In this episode of Manufacturing Transformed, Chris Schutte from Rise Industries shares how he turned a two-machine startup into a rapidly growing medical and aerospace supplier in just a few short years. Starting as a one-man operation, Chris focused on surrounding himself with...

What does it actually take to break through the $3M ceiling in a machine shop? For many manufacturers, that plateau isn't about lack of opportunity. It's about systems, structure, and the ability to scale without everything breaking. In this episode, Steve Macias of Pivot Manufacturing shares the real story behind that transition, from surviving early volatility to building a business capable of s...

What happens when you bet everything on a struggling job shop… and then decide to completely rebuild how it operates from the inside out? That's exactly what Andrew Crook did when he purchased Dynamic Fabrication in 2017. Instead of continuing business as usual, he made a bold decision to narrow the customer base, shift toward aerospace and defense, and invest heavily in systems that could support...

In this episode of Manufacturing Transformed, we head to British Columbia to explore how Mahler Machining is replacing spreadsheets, paper travelers, and tribal knowledge with a scalable digital backbone.  Aaron Kennedy shares how the team transitioned a 30+ person shop with roughly 700 active jobs into ProShop in just a few months, dramatically tightening feedback loops, improving visibility, and...

In this episode of Manufacturing Transformed, I sit down with Bryan from Lafarge & Egge to talk about what real operational transformation looks like inside a highly specialized aerospace manufacturer. When Bryan joined the company, he stepped into a shop full of deep experience and craftsmanship—but also a lot of legacy processes. Critical information lived across spreadsheets, Access databases,...

For most manufacturing founders, the early years mean fighting fires, working late nights, and inheriting old ways of working. But what if you could skip the legacy headaches and design your shop for the future—right from day one? That's exactly what David Bamforth did at Renscott Manufacturing. David didn't inherit a tired, paper-heavy organization—he started Renscott as a college student, purcha...

For many job shops, the "perfect storm" looks like this: Your legacy ERP software is becoming obsolete due to Windows updates, and your two most senior employees, holding 72 years of combined tribal knowledge, are retiring at the same time. That was the reality facing Justin Westerfeld at Die-Craft Engineering. Die-Craft, a high-mix, low-volume shop averaging just 2-3 parts per order, was at a cro...

Some shops measure parts in millimeters. Lange Machine and Tool measures them in tons, up to 80,000 pounds, to be exact. But running a shop that handles massive mining and foundry components with a small batch, high-mix workflow presents a unique data challenge. For decades, Craig Lange's family business relied on paper cost cards and a custom-built Access database to keep track of it all. It work...

Most machine shop startups are defined by hustle, long hours, and organized chaos. But when Garrett Wolfford founded Elemental Design + Machinery in January 2024, he had a different blueprint: "Small headcount, high discipline". While many owners wait years to professionalize their operations, Garrett built the foundation of a major aerospace facility for a team of just three people. He didn't wai...

In this episode, I chat with Wesley Traumbauer of B&W Machine works. We examine what happens when a manufacturing business grows faster than the systems supporting it. As complexity increases, reliance on memory, informal communication, and disconnected tools creates friction that compounds daily. What once felt manageable begins to erode trust in schedules, delivery dates, and capacity, making ev...

When Cody Joy joined Ferrera Tooling Company in 2020, the shop was growing rapidly but struggling with chaotic systems. Scheduling relied on a single Google Sheet, paper travelers cluttered the floor, and quality records were scattered across uncontrolled spreadsheets. Twice-weekly meetings attempted to manage priorities, but inefficiencies threatened to stall the company's expansion into aerospac...

Faircloth Machine Shop's journey is one of remarkable transformation. Founded in the late 1960s as a manual machining operation, it was modernized under David Pannell, who joined in 1994 and helped transition the shop into CNC machining. By 2017, Faircloth adopted ProShop ERP, moving away from paper records and embracing digital systems that enabled growth into aerospace manufacturing. ProShop pro...

Some shop owners work their way up from the shop floor. Chris Basgall arrived from the opposite direction. Before buying Catamount Machine Works, he spent decades leading IT, operations, and large-scale transformation inside one of the world's biggest telecommunications companies, serving 350 million customers across continents. Then he walked away from corporate life, moved his family to Florida,...

Some shops grow fast. But very few grow fast and stay in control. Prosper-Tech is doing both, and doing it with intention. In just two years, Andrew and Gabby Devroy have helped transform the company Andrew's parents built in a garage into a 30-person aerospace and medical machining powerhouse, all while raising three kids and navigating the complexities of a second-generation business. Their appr...

Matt Bruner, co-founder of American Precision Works (APW), shares the journey of launching a modern machine shop in urban Philadelphia with his partner, John Celley. Founded in October 2024, APW was built on a "clean slate" philosophy, emphasizing automation, streamlined systems, and a people-first approach. With complementary backgrounds (John in machining and Matt in sales and operations) they a...

Snider Precision began as a garage-based machine shop founded by Damon Snider's father in 1978, growing organically over decades through grit, bold decisions, and a passion for machining. Damon started helping as a child, deburring parts and learning CNC operations before joining the Navy. After his father fired an unreliable crew, Damon returned to help and eventually took over the business, brin...

Oakdale Precision, a manufacturing company, transformed after adopting Pro Shop ERP. Previously reliant on a homegrown software system and tools like spreadsheets, whiteboards, and scattered network drives, the company faced challenges in scheduling, quality control, and tribal knowledge transfer. As the company grew, these limitations became unsustainable, prompting leadership to seek a more stru...

Matt Torres is the Founder of Rise Armament, a company that manufactures drop-in triggers, rifles, and other firearm accessories. Rise Armament was founded in 2012 as a job shop specializing in contract work for the oil and gas, as well as aerospace industries. Around 2014 or 2015, Matt began designing a drop-in trigger as a side project, driven more by personal interest than business intent. Howe...

Gurecky Manufacturing, a third-generation family-owned machine shop, has evolved from humble beginnings in a garage to a 42,000-square-foot facility with over 60 employees. Founded in 1983 by Kellen Montpetit's grandfather, the company has long served the oil and gas sector, though recent efforts aim to diversify into aerospace and other industries.  Kellen, now part of the ownership group, and An...

Dan Fifer, Founder of Lane4 Precision, shares his unconventional journey into manufacturing after a 20-year career in medical device engineering. Frustrated by long lead times in R&D, he set out to build a high-performance machine shop to support fast-paced development cycles. Despite having no prior machining experience, he took a leap of faith, selling his house to buy a Citizen L20 Swiss screw...

Paramount Machine, based in Salt Lake City, Utah, is a well-established and highly diversified machine shop with around 70 employees and a wide range of machining capabilities. They specialize in CNC (Computer Numerical Control) machine work, including complex operations such as multi-axis and five-axis machining, and serve multiple industries, particularly the medical, defense, and x-ray equipmen...