Boosting production at Boose: the cross pollination of ideas between two different plants has turned the Boose companies into a jobbing juggernaut.

The shift is nearing its end at Boose at Cornwall (BAC), Lebanon, Pa., but instead of winding down, a buzz has been struck up. It's not the standard buzz of induction furnaces, automatic molding lines, conveyer-driven finishing cells and oscillating shakeout that you'd hear every day in a high-production facility such as this one. It's the buzz that comes from a common question and answer floating through a crowd.

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"Are you ready for the meeting?"

"Yeah, you?"

The Boose brass has arrived at the facility, and the floor workers are shutting down their machines and preparing to gather at the northwest end of the plant, near the entrance, which leads to the administrative offices. Few in the building know what to expect. They'll be attending the annual incentives meeting, but the year before, the plant was Cornwall Aluminum Foundry and owned by a different individual, making this the plant's first annual incentives meeting.

The meeting is a cross-pollination from the programs already in place at Boose Aluminum Foundry Co. Inc., Reamstown, Pa., where the Boose management team has long been running a different business, but with a similar management style. The incentives meetings are scheduled in order to distribute company-wide awards for achievement in safety, cost-saving and inventory control.

Now that the Boose group has come into ownership of BAC, many such strategies have been shared between the two plants, and the family's assets now comprise a job shop with a kick--an ability to compete on high-production parts.

"A lot of things are going on between the plants, being able to bring staff over here, being able to throw a casting in there," said Don Varner, Boose Muminum's director of manufacturing. "It gives us an opportunity for continuous improvement."

Over the past several years, opportunities for continuous improvement have been in great supply. While considering costly upgrades to their existing plant in August 2006, company executives learned about two other companies for sale, Cornwall Aluminum with several modern, high production lines and Cast Technologies, Brickerville, Pa., with a solid customer list and a few pieces of equipment available. Since purchasing those assets, the company has increased its yearly revenues by 30%.

"There's not a lot that comes our way that we can't handle," said Jeff Enck, BAC plant manager.

Gaining Some Purchase

The Boose investors now operate their businesses as separate, wholly-owned entities. Cornwall Aluminum, located 20 miles from Boose Aluminum, became BAC, and the new business immediately brought the larger company increased flexibility, with three automatic molding lines across 57,000 sq. ft. of space. Those three matchplate molding lines (14 x 19, 30 x 32 and 20 x 24 in.) continue to operate at the Cornwall plant as they did prior to the purchase.

The investors decided not to retain Cast Technologies' manufacturing facility, keeping instead its customer list and spare parts. Its employees were offered jobs at either remaining Boose location.

Together, BAC and Boose Aluminum continue to serve aluminum castings primarily to commercial and military markets, as well as medical, electrical, tooling, architectural lighting and automotive aftermarket customers. The upper management of Boose Aluminum now operate the Cornwall plant, with many of the original personnel.

"We retained the majority of the Cornwall employees," said Roger Boose, president. "Upper management was released, but personnel from mid-management down remained onboard."

Prior to the acquisitions, Boose Aluminum, which has nearly 100,000 sq. ft. of facility space, shipped almost 3 million lbs./year, and Cornwall was at 2 million lbs./year. Boose said that BAC should increase to about 3 million lbs., taking on some of the work that was produced at the original plant. The work that stems from Cast Technologies' customer list has been picked up at Boose Aluminum.

Cornwall was working only one shift at the time of its acquisition. It has expanded to a full day and a partial second shift to accommodate the increase in production. The company already has increased sales revenues by 23%.

"We immediately started with some overtime," Boose said. "They shut down the day of the sale and resumed production the following Monday."

An Old Dog Teaches New Tricks

In addition to metalcasting, Enck also has a background in military service. He's spent a lifetime in metalcasting work, starting as a patternmaker before joining Cornwall Aluminum, but he also has served six years in the U.S. Army Reserves. So, it's more than just a cliche when he uses a military metaphor to describe BAC's recent transformation.

"It was like the cavalry coming over the ridge," he said of the Boose acquisition. The previous ownership did a lot of things right, he added, but the influx of technical support, human resources and capital has been significant.

In addition to improving sand quality and providing full lab facilities with non-destructive testing about a half hour down the road at Boose Aluminum, the Boose group has retrofitted BAC's six 2,400-lb. induction furnaces with indicator light systems that help determine how much power is being used or if power has been lost on a unit. The furnaces also were given all new heating elements, and a 3,000-lb. tilt furnace was added to augment their melt production.

BAC now has the people necessary to operate the new light system and maintain high level sand quality. The facility for the first time has a human resources department and, with some help from employees coming over in the Cast Technologies deal, has increased its hourly and salaried workforce from 45 to 54.

"Now I have someone to handle hiring and safety issues, making sure we come into compliance with EPA and OSHA requirements," Enck said. "That has been the biggest help. Getting good people has been the toughest thing for us."

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BAC has seen other changes that are intended to streamline the workforce, rather than grow it, including a complete renovation of the finishing room layout. The Boose group has outfitted the entire operation in conveyor belts, with continuous flow the ultimate goal. Parts are taken by conveyor from shakeout to a de-gating station, where two operators do the heavy cutting and return the castings to the belt. The castings then enter a large rectangular layout, with grinding stations placed at regular intervals around the perimeter. As the castings pace around the quad, grinding personnel remove them, perform their designated task, and replace them once again. The new layout is intended to achieve cost savings in part due to a decrease in required manpower; however, Boose said layoffs will not be necessary. There's always a need in other areas of the plant or at the Reamstown location.

"If you bring in a busload of 20 people, we'd hire them all," Boose said. Varner agreed that the Reamstown plant is in no danger of being overloaded with bodies. "We'll be shuffling a lot of people, but we don't anticipate losing any employees," he said.

Fully operational as of the beginning of the year, the new layout should result in an 80% decline in material handling and 30% cost savings, according to the company's estimates. "The old system was very inefficient," Boose said. "Actually, Boose Aluminum was kind of inefficient as well. But we're more jobbing oriented."

An Old Dog Learns New Tricks

Since its owners' two purchases, the jobbing-oriented Boose Aluminum has regained some of the attention. It was already doing well, having added a second shift in the past year to accommodate existing business, which has shown a growth rate in excess of 14% per year since 2003. And in the process of buying Cornwall Aluminum, the owners happened upon increased upgrading capital, receiving government refunds for the money involved in the purchases. Those refunds have since been reinvested.

"We set a retained earnings target every year," Varner said. "Through reinvesting profits and bond funds made available through the acquisition, $4.5 million has been invested in Boose Aluminum in the past three years."

Included among the changes that have been completed are two new coremaking machines, an upgraded heat treating unit, a spinner hanger blast machine and a new sand handling system.

Most immediately on the horizon, Boose Aluminum will install a new cope and drag line, which will be used to slip into the casting size void left between the shop's smaller squeezer work and larger nobake and rotolift parts.

"There's a lot of [opportunities] out there. We're seeing a lot of the work we've quoted and it's gone to green sand," Varner said. "We're truly a jobbing shop. There's been growth in ]certain markets], but it's not isolated."

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Regardless, the Boose group isn't too concerned with determining exactly where the growth might be; they're ready for anything. The new 40 x 40 in. automated cope and drag line, along with its five rotolifts, three squeezers and a large nobake line, is intended to make the company capable of producing any casting that falls in its wide range of capabilities.

"Labor was a primary driver for [the new line]," Varner said. "Then we sized it for that area of the market--things that were too big for our green sand squeezer work but too small for nobake." About 15-20% of the rotolift work will be going over to the new machine when it is up and running in August, he added, but the old school machinery will not be replaced completely.

Closing the Generation Gap

At BAC, Enck's enthusiasm for the influx of new people, ideas and capital may not have infiltrated the entire plant just yet. Floor workers hanging around following the first incentives meeting on safety downplayed its significance.

"I'm careful anyway," said ladle operator Phil Seig. "It's hot metal."

But if the growth of Boose Aluminum over its 75-year history is any indication, BAC should brace for prosperous times. Boose describes the original plant in which his grandparents began making cast metal trinkets in the early 1930s as a "chicken coop." The company changed rapidly, though, as the start of World War II created demand for cast metal components. Producing parts for the war effort--and for the Korean War after that--laid the groundwork for the technical proficiency the Boose group of companies boasts today. The company got into commercial casting between the wars, but that didn't change its outlook.

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"Trying to do two different quality levels is out of the question," said Vernon Boose, a 60-year metalcasting veteran and current chairman of the board. "You produce the best quality casting you can for every casting. If you do that, you take the pressure off the sales people."

Today the company has 3,750 active patterns, has received 487 new jobs in the past three years and maintains internal scrap and return rates of 4.5 and 2.5%.

The Boose company is in the business of making good castings. But it recognizes the limitiations on its area of expertise. When it comes to administrative duties, the company in many cases seeks some help. Much like the back and forth of ideas between Boose Aluminum and BAC, the company draws on the expertise of outsiders. Since 1965, it has maintained an eight-person board composed of four members from fields such as law and accounting in addition to four in-family decision makers.

"We push the team effect as much as possible," Roger Boose said. "We're extremely happy that we're going the direction we're going. It's a lot of hard work, but the team has dug in and made it happen, and that's what has gotten us to where we are today."

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Boose Companies, Reamstown and Cornwall, Pa.

     Facility Size:   157,000 sq. ft. (two plants).
  Castings Shipped:   5.4 million lbs./year.
      Monthly Melt:   720,000 lbs.
Casting Size Range:   Ounces to 3,000 lbs.
       Metals Cast:   Primarily A356, SR319, 535, A206 and aluminum.
 Casting Processes:   Green sand, nobake.
         Employees:   214.
    Markets Served:   Commercial, military, medical, electrical,
                      tooling, architectural lighting and automotive.

Shea Gibbs, Associate Editor