Due to a jump in demand, Streetsboro’s Waltco facility on Miller Parkway will be doubling the number of its employees in the coming months, according to Jarno Jli-Junnila, operations manager for Hiab, Waltco’s parent company.
More:Waltco Lift Corp. leaves Tallmadge for Streetsboro for more space
He said the Streetsboro facility would net about 100 new jobs, doubling the site’s workforce.
Since Waltco moved to Streetsboro from Tallmadge about two years ago, the Streetsboro facility has focused primarily on lift gates, Waltco’s staple, but now the facility will be producing Moffett M8 forklifts, explained Jli-Junnila.
Streetsboro Economic Development Director Patrick O’Malia explained that Moffett and Waltco are subsidiaries of Hiab. The parent company of Hiab, in turn, owned by Cargotec.
Waltco has historically manufactured lift gates that are installed on the rear ends of box trucks, tractor trailers, pick-up trucks and other vehicles with rear-end loading to help improve safety and speed up work.
“Safety is really our culture,” said Marty Behner, operations manager of the Streetsboro Waltco facility. “That’s how we sell products.”
Compared with using a dolly to carry heavy loads down a narrow ramp, Waltco Vice President of Sourcing and Engineering Scott Ickes said the lift gates are much safer.
Any time a delivery is made where there isn’t a bay, Behner said a lift gate can be helpful.
“You see a lot of them in gas stations in morning,” he said. “They’ll be loading or unloading pop.”
Depending on the model, Waltco lift gates can lift between 1,250 and 6,600 pounds at a a time, Ickes said. The Streetsboro factory produces about 20,000 lift gates annually.
“Our biggest customers are rental and leasing companies,” said Behner.
The Moffett M8 forklifts are designed to be both portable and used outdoors, said Jli-Junnila.
“The nice thing about comparing this with a normal one is this is designed for off-road use,” he explained. “We are going start producing these in the U.S. in Streetsboro. Urgently, we have a lot of orders. There’s a big demand for this.”
Behner said they’re especially helpful around construction sites for things like delivering materials.
“One of the first things it will do is deliver cement block,” he said. “You may have a building site that’s nothing but a hole in the ground, and they can bring these in before there’s even electricity on the site.”
In addition, they attach to the rear of trucks, so companies that deliver materials can take them keep one around for heavy jobs.
“Think of an 18-wheeler,” said O’Malia. “The forklift actually attaches right over the weeks.”
The M8 and similar models use the forks to lift the body of the vehicle off the ground at the rear of trucks.
Behner and Jli-Junnila take great pride in the safety record, cleanliness and retention of employees in Streetsboro.
The Streetsboro facility has become something of a "poster child for Magnet in the area," said Behner. Magnet is an organization that helps support northeast Ohio manufacturers.
The Streetsboro facility is designed in a way that emphasizes the use of color coding for safety and also efficiency. The floor is taped off by use, so people know exactly what a specific area is for. And each production line has a series of red, yellow and green lights how long each set of parts will last before it has to be restocked.
The Streetsboro facility also has a veteran workforce that Behner said he empower to address needs on their own. The production line employees, for example, are responsible for their own quality control. In addition, he said there's a process to audit the quality control process to make sure the employees are properly double checking their work.
A job fair is planned at Waltco, 1777 Miller Parkway, on Oct. 4 and 5. For more information, call 330-633-9191 or send a resume to joinwaltco@hiab.com. A variety of positions will be available.
Do you have a business or healthcare story you'd like to share? Reporter Bob Gaetjens can be reached at 330-541-9440, bgaetjens@recordpub.com and @bobgaetjens_rc.