About 146 miles — or a roughly two-and-a-half-hour drive- separates what I might consider two of the finest examples of what industrial finishing and coating is all about in North America.
Both shops reside in the great state of Indiana, which is not exactly known as the technology capital of the world. And, having lived in nearby Ohio nearly all my life, we Buckeyes look at the Hoosier state as producing two of the most prominent figures in our lifetimes: Larry Bird and David Letterman.
Yet, I found myself this month writing about two companies that should be held up as the epitome of what the finishing and coating industry is all about: innovation, persistence, ingenuity, hard work, and precision in meeting specifications.
Electro-Spec in Franklin, Indiana, also has a sister shop in South Carolina that recently sprouted up, but its roots were fostered in the Midwest. What owner Jeff Smith and his team do at Electro-Spec is as high-tech as any shop I have seen in my career. The parts are tiny and oh so incredibly important, as they go into heart pacemakers, medical implants, and many other components that require the utmost precision and attention to detail. Faulty parts or rejects can often cause harm or fatalities to those these microscopic parts were meant to help.
What Smith and his team do in their surprisingly quiet, clean, and unassuming shop, tucked away adjacent to farms and corn fields in middle Indiana, is nothing short of remarkable, and their expertise is unsurpassed. The company is decades old, but Smith tells me his sales have risen over 60% in the past year alone, and the coming year could be even higher. And that is because what Electro-Spec does in their facilities can not be matched in other shops, at least not overnight and not with a lot of exceptional talent working for them.
It is why they may have just a handful of competitors not only in the U.S. but across North America and the world. Yes, they are that good.
A few hours north, you will find Jamie Visker and his Winona Powder Coating operating out of a shop in Etna Green, Indiana, and another in Elkhart. The shop is a shining example of quality meeting mass coating, and Visker is a unique individual who dreamed up his business and executed the plan.
A few years ago, he wrote a big check for something he didn't want to get involved in, and that was electrocoat. Visker did it because his customers wanted him to, and because he and his team are very good at what they do. The result is a facility that can deliver a powder coat over an e-coat application that is virtually unstoppable. It is a delicate process that takes precision and expertise, and few shops can pull it off, let alone fund the investment to add such additional processes.
But that is what Visker does; he didn't grow up in the finishing and coating business but was instead an investment banker with an entrepreneurial side. Put that together, and you get a company such as Winona Powder Coating, which continually takes on tough tasks from some of the most demanding customers in the automotive and agricultural sectors. Again, they don't face that much competition because what they do is well above industry standards, and Visker would not have it any other way.
Who knew that a short drive up the Indiana interstate could deliver two prime examples of why finishing and coating is so important in the manufacturing cycle? Hats off to them for striving for the perfection many try to accomplish, but few reach.
Tim Pennington is Editor-in-Chief of Finishing and Coating, and has covered the industry since 2010. He has traveled extensively throughout North America visiting shops and production facilities, and meeting those who work in the industry. Tim began his career in the newspaper industry, then wound itself between the sports field with the PGA Tour and marketing and communications firms, and finally back into the publishing world in the finishing and coating sector. If you want to reach Tim, just go 
