When Jon Allen became General Manager of Luke Engineering and Manufacturing earlier this year, he and President Meghan Bates quickly decided on a change to the name of the company.
Meghan BatesThe manufacturing part of the name is going away, to be replaced by the term ‘anodizing,’ which better reflects the Wadsworth, Ohio companies core processes.
“We wanted to bring everything — including our name — into the 21st century,” says Allen, who joined Luke Engineering and Anodizing in 2019. “It was something both Meghan and I agreed on.”
Hardcoating Anodizing Technology
Luke Engineering and Anodizing specialize in anodizing and conversion coatings for aluminum with one of the largest tanks in North America at 10 feet long, 8 feet wide and 7 feet deep. The shop does business across the world in hardcoating anodizing technology, offering MIL-A-8625 Type II Class 1 & 2; Type III Class 1 & 2, AMS 2471 and 2472; ASTM-B-580 Type D, E, and F.
Allen was hired to be plant manager of Luke’s Rittman location a few miles from its Wadsworth headquarters and was named General Manager earlier this year to oversee both operations. Allen holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Mechanical Engineering, and an MBA in Business Management. He joined Luke with 18+ years working in the automotive market.
Jon Allen“I’m still the plant manager of both, with some additional duties to help Meghan in her new role,” he says of Bates, who became president to succeed Chris Jurey.
Family Tradition of Leadership
The company was created in 1964 by William Hayduk to apply specialty coatings to light metals for a variety of industries. Hayduk’s son, Fred, succeeded him as president of Luke Engineering and Anodizing, who was followed by Jurey, Fred’s brother-in-law. Bates is the granddaughter of William Hayduk.
“I never really had thoughts of working for my grandfather’s company when I was younger,” says Bates, who has been with the company since 2011, serving as a project manager and plant manager, before becoming vice president in 2018. Bates has a degree from Valparaiso and an MBA from Belmont University.
“I enjoyed working summers for my grandfather when I was a teenager,” she says. “But after graduating from college, I saw truly what this business was all about, and I decided it was something I wanted to do.”
When Allen was looking for a new career in 2019, he knew he wanted to work for a smaller, family-owned business that he could be more involved in running the operations. When the situation presented itself with Luke Engineering, he jumped at the chance even though his experience in running surface finishing operations was minimal.
“I met Chris Jurey through some networking opportunities, and we spoke about the possibility of joining Luke, but several months went by,” Allen says. “But when they started talking about a succession plan with Chris and Meghan, it made sense for the organization to move this transition quickly.”
Trying New and Different Approaches
Allen is a mechanical engineer by training but has developed an extensive background in sales and marketing. That combination is what attracted the Luke team to bringing Allen on board. With Fred Hayduk and Jurey still on the board of directors of the company, they have allowed Bates and Allen to try some new things and different approaches to managing the two operations to help spur growth.
“They have allowed trying some things, which often means making a few mistakes and burning our fingers,” Bates says.
Allen says the biggest issue facing the company is hiring staff to help the shop grow and function properly, which is why it necessitates he and Bates trying different approaches operationally to overcome the often lack of workforce.
“We have people making a ton of overtime, and for the most part that has been unregulated,” she says. “Since becoming president, I have been able to see more clearly where money is being spent and also looking for ways to better run our operations.”
‘Customer Service Driven’
While most of Luke’s customers are in the Northern Ohio area, they do have a network of customers spread out across the U.S., including some in Arizona and Louisiana, among others.
“They come to us because they know we will do a good job for them,” Allen says. “It’s not that we are the cheapest; we have neighbors who are much cheaper than us. It’s the quality and customer service they know we will give them.
Bates is even more succinct: “Our focus is on customer satisfaction and quality, so often times we will not be considered the cheapest.”
Luke Engineering and Anodizing have made a name for themselves as being specialized in hardcoating on die-cast parts, an often-tricky requirement that gives some anodizing shops trouble.
“We have a large handful of customers who we have been hardcoating their die-cast for years because they know we can do it successfully,” Bates says.
Development of Proprietary Coatings
Luke has a proprietary polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE) impregnation process called Lukon 24, which is a version of hardcoat anodizing that has the addition of this inert, non-stick fluoropolymer into the base hardcoat that greatly enhances its wear and corrosion resistance while reducing coefficients of friction.
They also have Lukon DC, a proprietary hardcoating process developed to form thick, hard anodic coatings on high-pressure aluminum die-castings. Bates says that high levels of alloying elements in die-castings — particularly silicon and copper — often interfere with the normal formation of anodic coatings.
“With Lukon DC, the electrolyte and electrical waveforms are modified to compensate for the lower aluminum and high alloy levels,” she says. “This allows for the formation of thicker and harder anodic coatings than previously thought possible.”
Both Bates and Allen feel that their new leadership approach — as well as new branding with adding anodizing to the name and dropping manufacturing — will spur even more growth for Luke Engineering and Anodizing.
“The goal is to get a bigger footprint in the industry,” Allen says. “We have about 320 customers, and around 80 are the main recurring customers for us. We want to grow that and think we are in a great spot to do that now.”
Visit https://lukeeng.com
