WLKM Radio 95.9 FM
Officials and employees from a Sturgis business last week introduced a new production line, incorporating a process that was previously outsourced.
Thursday’s start-up of a 110-foot assembly line was met with applause and cheers from employees at the REHAU Americas plant in Sturgis, as well as officials from the company’s Virginia-based headquarters.
Mark Kraus, REHAU’s director of engineering for interior solutions division, played a critical role in the process that brought the assembly line to Sturgis. He acknowledged Mark Reverman, warehouse manager of the Sturgis plant, as well as its two dozen local employees.
REHAU’s Sturgis plant is a manufacturing facility of finished cabinets and cabinetry components
Company officials said REHAU Americas used to outsource the laminate-pressing process to locations elsewhere in the U.S. and, in some cases, overseas. The new lamination line brings the pressing step in-house to Sturgis, streamlining the production process and investing in the Sturgis plant’s growth, company officials said.
The addition of the new line brings with it four new, full-time jobs, Kraus said. He said the line was authorized in 2022 and custom made over the course of a year to REHAU’s specifications. The company’s only other line identical to what has been assembled in the Sturgis plant is in China, Kraus added.
Product made at the 82,000-square-foot Sturgis plant ultimately ends up in locations around the United States and Canada.
