Gerome Manufacturing officials say new facility ‘puts us on the map’
GEORGES TWP. — A Fayette County manufacturer celebrated the official opening of a new facility in the Fayette Business Park.
Gerome Manufacturing Co. announced the opening of a $9 million, 150,000-square-foot plant in Georges Township that will replace its two existing facilities in North Union Township.
“This puts us on the map,” said company president Joe Putila in a ceremony Oct. 17. “We hope to become a world-class manufacturer. We hope to grow the company and hire a lot more people and have secure, good-paying jobs for many years to come.”
Gerome, which was founded in the basement of a Hopwood home in 1957, makes custom precision sheet metal products for various industries. It previously operated its production building on Route 119 and its finishing, assembly and shipping operations from its original plant on Oliver Road.
The facility consolidates the operations of Gerome’s two previous buildings, which comprised a total of 121,000 square feet.
Putila, who has been with the company for 26 years, said Gerome collaborated with Fay-Penn Economic Development Council, the Washington County Chamber of Commerce and Washington Financial Bank to further the project, which began in early 2012.
Ground broke for the facility in June 2013 under the supervision of Bear Construction of Canonsburg.
Company founder Henry M. Gerome was on hand to celebrate the opening of the plant.
“When I started this business so many years ago, I had no idea what it would become,” Gerome said. “I’m at a loss for words, so I’ll let this place speak for itself.”
Gerome Manufacturing transitioned its operations into the facility in March after the building’s completion, Putila said.
Gerome worked with Fay-Penn on potential site location and selection and financing options for the plant. Putila said that after the plan for the project was approved by the company’s board of directors, the search for financial support led Gerome to Washington County.
“There were a few people in the area said that this project wasn’t possible,” Putila said. “But we found some people in Washington who knew about the LTEN program that was developed by the state.
Bill King, senior vice president and commercial banking manager at Washington Financial, said funding for the project was made available through the state’s local tax exempt note, or LTEN, program, which allows banks to provide loans with lower-than-usual interest rates.
“If a manufacturer qualifies under the state guidelines for the program, a bank can lend money to the manufacturer and the bank would not have to pay taxes on the income from the loan,” explained King. “So the bank can pass those savings on to the manufacturer in the form of a lower interest rate.
“In Gerome’s case, they would pay approximately 70 percent of the interest they would normally pay.”
Fay-Penn also provided funding to Gerome with a low-interest loan.
Fay-Penn board chairman William Blaney noted the development that has occurred in the Fayette Business Park and other areas of the county, but said the opening of Gerome’s new facility was “special.”
“In colloquial terms, you might say this is ‘local boy makes good,'” Blaney said. “I’m really tickled that somebody from Fayette County put together an operation, they could grow a business, they could employ people, they could help sustain the economy, they could pay taxes, they could buy local — and you end up with a facility like this.
“I congratulate you, commend you and your family for the investment, and thank you for staying.”
Bill Flanagan, executive vice president of the Allegheny Conference on Community Development, talked about an upswing of industry in the region and noted that the future looks bright for manufacturing.
“Gerome Manufacturing has taken a pretty big risk, (but) I think we believe very strongly it’s a really prudent investment,” he said.
“Right now our region has so much going for it. We’re only at the very beginning of the beginning of what we’re going to see in terms of manufacturing investment in southwestern Pennsylvania over the next 25-30 years.”
During his speech, Putila commended the hard work of Gerome employees.
“There’s nobody that’s employed here that’s more important than anybody else,” he said.
“Everybody here has a job to do and everybody does their job to the best of their ability.”
The company employs about 90 people, all of which were retained in the move, said Putila.
He said the company will need to hire additional workers as its operations expand.
“We’re trying to get some young blood in here,” he said.
“It’s a good job. We have all the benefits. You can raise a family on it. As we grow, we’re going to need more people.”
Gerome designs and manufactures products for manufacturing giants such as Siemens, Mitsubishi and ABB, and homeland defense projects.
Products include magnetic shielding for sensitive instrumentation, electronic enclosures, internal chassis fabrications, instrument enclosures, sheet metal enclosures for computers, power supplies and motor controls.
In addition to their sheet metal capabilities, they also provide bus bar and metal-working techniques to form, shape, machine, heat-treat and finish various materials.