In the business world, who you know is often as important as what you know. For Paul V. Alongi, CEO and founder of Maac Machinery Corp., which makes heavy-gauge, sheet-fed thermoforming machines, both have been crucial to business.
Alongi entered the plastics industry early in his career. Right after college, he went to work for Power Transmission Equipment Co., a Chicago-based power-transmission engineering firm, servicing the account of Comet Industries Inc., which until 1970 was the dominant supplier of heavy-gauge sheet-fed thermoforming machines.
Alongi's early relationship with Comet was fortuitous. In 1996, Maac Machinery acquired Comet, and in 1998, it added another major thermoforming machine supplier, Central Automated Machinery Inc. (CAM). With the acquisitions, both Bob Kostur, the thermoforming pioneer who had founded Comet, and Bruce Smith, former president of CAM, took executive positions at Maac Machinery. In its 50,000-square-foot facility in the Chicago suburb of Carol Stream, Ill., Maac Machinery has brought those companies' innovations together.
Maac Machinery is now in its 34th year. But Alongi isn't stepping aside: He still puts in 40-hour weeks, down from the 80-hour weeks he put in while building his business. He recently spoke with Plastics Machinery Magazine senior correspondent John DeGaspari.
Tell us about when you started Maac Machinery. Was there a "eureka" moment that led you to establish a foothold in the industry?
ALONGI: It was just an opportunity to be able to use your education, what you thought you were good at. The marketplace was pretty bumpy back then. The basic thinking was, if Comet could have 80 percent of the industry in the 1960s with their technology and design, it could be done again. When they went from [producing] 400 machines [a year] to six, all the other firms sprang up to try to make a difference in the marketplace. The 1970s were the roughest years. We came in 1982 and thought we could do it quickly, but of course, it was a long road.
What do you see as some of the major technical milestones of thermoforming machine design?
ALONGI: Our machines have always had motorized platens, and now, pretty much everybody else's [do] too. The new stuff is that those platens today can move twice as fast. Forty years ago, the accuracy might have been in the eighth of an inch range, 125 thousandths. Now they can be held to 2 thousandths; 0.125 versus 0.002 inch. It's more expensive to do 0.002 than it is to do 0.125, but depending on the application, we'll make that decision and advise the client.
Our high sheet line rotary design has become an industry standard. Maac's multiple oven zoning pretty much has also become a standard in the industry, and high-performance heating systems, so whether it would be how fast you could heat a sheet or how energy-efficient you can heat a sheet, we have solved both of those.
What did the acquisitions of Comet Industries and CAM bring to the table for Maac Machinery?
ALONGI: No. 1 was to bring all of our technology in-house. Both those sellers came on board as Maac employees. Comet's Bob Kostur and CAM's Bruce Smith, both were brilliant engineers. They both had some items that Maac didn't have, mostly design engineering and how they assembled what they used for parts. Sometimes it's valves, and sometimes it's assemblies or subassemblies; sometimes it's the sum of all the little parts that makes the difference.
Maac writes all of its software inhouse today, versus going to third-party developers. How has that helped you service your customers' machines?
ALONGI: We can run any of the machines that we manufacture, from here, regardless of if they are in Indonesia, wherever. As long as they have an Internet connection, we can troubleshoot that machine from [Chicago]. It also saves our client downtime, because from here to wherever in the world, it takes time and money to get there and get back. Over 95 percent of our service calls are done that way.
What are some of the big changes you have seen since you got started in the industry and since your entry as a business in 1982?
ALONGI: Advances of our client base have been phenomenal over the last 12 years or so. They've turned what some people have explained as an art into an engineered science. The machines are more sophisticated, and the client now has 100 percent control of the machine; rather than in years gone by, they might have been able to use 10 percent or 20 percent of the machine's capability and never get beyond that.
How do you work with your customers to get the best advantage out of their machines?
ALONGI: Our training program with each sale, we wouldn't take an order unless the guy said he is coming in to train on it. [At] our facility, we can fully assemble and test. We have 6,000 amps of 480 volts just for testing, so we can run a machine, regardless of how big it is. I think a lot more of that is happening industrywide now.
Since 1982, you have moved your business four times. How has that helped you accommodate your business?
ALONGI: The first time we were only there for a year. Year One we built three machines; today, we average about 60 machines a year. We designed and built [the present facility in Carol Stream] from the ground up, so it wasn't like we bought something and tried to make it work. We probably are 10 percent more efficient in manufacturing than anybody else could be in a building that wasn't specifically designed to do what we do.
We also [have] run two shifts for the last 20 years. Those are two full-time shifts, so we are running about 100 people today, over those two shifts. Our office has about 25 people, so the other 75 are split between the two shifts. Engineering staff today is about 10, and we [offer] full-time worldwide service and parts. Thirty-six percent of our machines are shipped outside of the United States, all over the world.
How are you helping to train the next generation of people entering the industry?
ALONGI: We have $10,000 machine grants to colleges. Our flagship college is Penn College [Pennsylvania College of Technology, Williamsport], which has become our industry's largest training center. We have machines at over 30 universities, including UCLA, University of Wisconsin, Penn State, Illinois State University and Kettering University. That's our way of giving back to the industry.
It's a $10,000 machinery grant on any of our equipment. These are new machines with new technology. Years ago, companies would write off an old piece of equipment and give it to a local school; but the machines were 30 years old and the only thing that colleges would learn was what not to do, or how it used to be 30 years ago.
With this program, we sometimes couple up with the Society of Plastics Engineers; I've been a member for 29 years. And they have a $10,000 grant. The most popular machine is about a $40,000 priced machine. If the SPE gives them $10,000 and Maac gives them $10,000, they get a brand-new, $40,000 piece of college equipment for $20,000 or 50 cents on the dollar.
Maac employs several Alongi family members. How important is family to your business?
ALONGI: We have three sets of brothers that work here. The president of Maac is my brother, James. He is also the treasurer of the SPE Thermoforming Board, he sits on the executive board of directors. Then I have three sons here. The director of sales is my son, Michael; the sales manager is my son, Paul Ryan; and the engineering and operations manager is my son, Peter. The third set is my brother James' sons. The sales project manager is my nephew, Dave, and the manager of mechanical engineering here is my nephew, James J. My brother has been here almost 20 years, and Michael is on his 17th year.
How has being a family business contributed to your business?
ALONGI: Trust is at the highest, communication is at the highest, and seriousness is at the highest. All of these Generation Xers, all five of them, have 100 percent buy-in into their careers. You couldn't plan it if you wanted to. Now, they are turning into the second generation, so they will make sure this place is around for a few more decades at least. Not that I intend to leave just yet.
What are your customers asking of you, and how important are customized machines to your customer base?
ALONGI: We call it application specific. Basically, we have two machine lines: the Maac line and the Comet line. We have four models in each line. We have 36 sizes for each model. Each model has about 85 options. So the sales department here is really more application engineering; which line, which model, which size and then, out of all of those options, which ones are we going to put on this piece of equipment, to give the client the most performance and value. About 60 percent of our business is from repeat clients. The first machine that we made 34 years ago is still out there making parts.
How do you want to be remembered?
ALONGI: I like to see the success of our clients. It's kind of like the satisfaction a teacher sees in a student. I don't think you can put a price on that. It just kind of makes you smile on the inside. And even though most clients will never come back and say thank you, just by seeing their success, by using our engineering, and our equipment, and our style of doing things, it has a lot of gratification. Kind of like doing the right thing, and what goes around comes around.
