BusinessWest

Chamberlain Group Has Become a Model of Success

They were working in Hollywood special effects when someone suggested that they take their model-making talents and put them to use making lifelike body parts for medical training. That’s how Eric and Lisa Chamberlain entered an exciting new field with a world of growth potential. They’ve become a leader in that realm because of something they’ve taken from their days working on Arnold Schwarzenegger movies — what Lisa called a “propensity for invention.”

It’s called the ‘bullet-time effect,’ a term that has come to describe a filming technique that goes way, way beyond simple slow motion.
Perhaps the best-known example of this effect are the sequences in the movie The Matrix, where, for example, the character played by Keanu Reeves leaps in the air and appears to suspend there while the point of view rotates 360 degrees around him to reveal a series of improbable, hyper-slow-motion activities, such as bullets flying at and past him.
Eric and Lisa Chamberlain were part of the team that designed the camera system for those sequences, and, as it turned out, this was to be their last real work in Hollywood special effects. Indeed, by that time (1998), their talents with model making — on display in several other movies, including Judge Dredd, Eraser, and Starship Troopers — had caught the attention of someone in a completely different field: the making of physical models (body parts) for medical training.
That individual, Mark Curtis, a subcontractor who did staff training for medical-device makers, eventually gave the Chamberlains a few projects, such as one to build a human leg on which individuals could practice saphenous vein dissection. Before long, the two were hooked. And soon, they saw this emerging industry as a way to trade the erratic lifestyle of a special-effects artist — “it’s OK if you’re willing to live like a gypsy,” said Lisa, noting an inconsistency in work and thus cash flow — for something more potentially stable. Meanwhile, it was also as a way to remain in the Berkshires, a region they had come to love.
Fast-forwarding through the ensuing 12 years — and a steep learning curve on the broad subject of anatomy (more on that later) — the Chamberlain Group, the company formed by the couple, has become an industry leader in physical model making. Its customers include medical-device makers such as Johnson & Johnson, Boston Scientific, and Intuitive Surgical, as well as medical care providers ranging from Johns Hopkins to the Lahey Clinic to Baystate Medical Center.
The company currently does business in 48 states and 50 countries, supplying customers with everything from entire hearts (some that beat) to a synthetic bowl product, called Tactility, developed in collaboration with Baystate for use in the training of residents.
And when asked how this success was accomplished, both Eric and Lisa Chamberlain went back to their days with The Matrix and several Arnold Schwarzenegger movies to help find answers.
“When you work in special effects, you have a propensity toward invention,” said Lisa. “You’re essentially recreating something from scratch, without relying too much on the work you’ve done before. Doing something new was just part of the game, and that has kept us very open-minded to learning and developing.”
This open-mindedness, coupled with film work involving three dimensions, has transferred nicely to the making of body parts, said Eric, noting that the team at Chamberlain Group, like special-effects artists, are, in a nutshell, problem solvers and solution finders.
“Each project is different and has its own set of challenges,” he said, while drawing comparisons to his previous line of work. “You’re just diving in each time; the learning curve is different with every project.”
Lisa Chamberlain did not disclose sales figures, but growth for the Chamberlain Group has been steady, and the outlook is positive, despite predictions made years ago that the medical field would, like aerospace, come to rely on computer simulation for much if not all of its training.
For this issue, BusinessWest takes a look at what goes on inside the Chamberlain Group facilities in Great Barrington, and why the company’s operating slogan, “Bringing Practice to the Practice of Medicine,” has become a formula for success.

Body of Evidence
There’s a framed copy of the poster from the first Ghostbusters movie hanging on a wall just off the front lobby of the company’s headquarters. It’s one of many mementos from the days when the Chamberlains were working for R/Greenberg Associates in New York, where they met.
Eric was head of physical effects for the production company, specializing in miniature models, mechanical effects, and motion controls, while working on pictures ranging from Ghostbusters to Tootsie, while Lisa worked more on the promotions end, working on posters (like the one on the wall), trailers, and other forms of advertising.
Seeking to get away from the bustle of Gotham, the Chamberlains and others at R/Greenberg headed for the Berkshires to join a budding special-effects house called Mass Illusion, where they created a memorable explosion scene in Eraser, among many other credits.
By 1997, however, a number of circumstances were colliding to bring the couple into the medical field. Mass Illusion was in the process of migrating to the West Coast, Mark Curtis was starting to feed projects to the freelance model makers, and the Chamberlains were looking for more stability in their careers.
At first, they had no idea of what they were getting into with medical models, understanding only that it was work — which they needed.
“We said, ‘sure, what’s that?’” noted Lisa, when recalling Curtis’s initial inquiries. “We were like all good freelancers — you take the work first and figure it out after.
“Eventually, we saw this as a way to take our talents and put them to a different end, we felt, and a more meaningful end,” she said. “And the anatomy part became very attractive to us, so much so that we thought that, from an intellectual-curiosity standpoint, this would be a great opportunity, and from a wanting-to-stay-in-the-Berkshires standpoint, it would potentially make for a more even-keeled life.”
Near the end of 1998, the two had made up their minds to take their careers in this new direction — and they took several Mass Illusion artists along for the ride.
But first, they had to learn anatomy. Actually, they learned it as they went, burying their noses in Gray’s Anatomy and other 3-inch-thick volumes, while also asking myriad questions of physicians and even attending several surgical procedures to observe first-hand how and why physicians do what they do.
Eric joked that they thought about taking a college course or two on the subject, but couldn’t find the time because their business was growing so fast. “Anatomy was a real learning curve,” he said. “It was almost like going to med school.”
Lisa agreed. “There was a huge amount of learning,” said the college English major, who can now recite the names of hundreds of surgical procedures or the corresponding acronyms. “We learned a procedure, an anatomical sequence at a time, and we always tell our clients, ‘teach us as if you were teaching a resident or a physician about your new device.
“We know our stuff — because we have to,” she went on, “And we’re pleased when we hear surgeons say, as one did last week, ‘boy, you guys really know a lot of anatomy.’”

In the Right Vein

They’ve heard that phrase, or words to that effect, many times over the years, as they’ve introduced new products and added new lines to the client list, a process that gained some serious momentum after the Chamberlains attended a medical-device convention for the Society of Thoracic Surgeons in Fort Lauderdale in the winter of 2000.
“We went there essentially to see who the competition was, and what we found was that there was very little competition,” Lisa explained. “We got very excited and said, ‘there’s real potential here to make a business. We passed out business cards — we had no real sales/marketing plan or any experience in those areas — and started a contact at a time, and a project a time.”
Much of the early work was with hearts, which led to the development of several different models, including one that beats, as well as accompanying component parts such as small blood vessels for bypass-surgery training, radial arteries for harvesting, and many others. Eventually, though, the company branched out into other areas of the anatomy, and in each case, the products involved what she called “involved interaction.”
The basic operating strategy, she continued, is to “wait for the phone to ring” with requests from medical-device makers and health care providers for specific (and sometimes very specific) training aids.
Such was the case with Baystate and Tactility, she explained, noting that the product, developed in conjunction with Baystate with the help of a $150,000 grant from the John Adams Innovation Institute, represents a significant improvement over the pig intestine that had been used in resident training.
There is no catalog, per se, although several products are listed on the Web site, said Chamberlain, because the company believes it serves its customers better by engaging them in what they desire to purchase.
“Not every piece of anatomy is designed to do what it is that you want to do with it,” she explained, choosing the words carefully. “So we try to engage our clients to find out what their needs are, and then meet those needs.”
The company produces perhaps 100 different models of the heart, she continued, all with some standard equipment, but with variations on the theme depending on the intended subject matter for training.
When it comes to making trainers for medical-device makers, said Lisa, the company usually starts with a prototype sent by the manufacturer with the purpose of familiarizing Chamberlain Group artisans with the device’s use and “tissue interaction,” which she called a critical part of the learning process when it comes to manufacturing useful tissues that behave like the real thing.
This is part of what she called a “knowledge-extraction process” the company goes through with clients, and while discussing it, she again drew comparisons to movie special-effects work, and specifically those aspects of creating things from scratch — and working tirelessly to create a solution.
“We’re serious people taking a serious approach,” she explained. “You don’t get to the top of the industry in visual effects by working a 9-to-5 job. That was never our mode, and it’s not our mode today.”
One of company’s early clients (and still a steady customer) is Intuitive Surgical, maker of the da Vinci surgical robot, said Lisa, noting that, about a decade ago, the Chamberlain Group developed something called the ‘robotic trainer kit,’ a simple skills kit that has enabled the company’s products to reach markets around the world, and remains one of its best-selling items.
Word-of-mouth referrals, coupled with a high degree of mobility within the medical-device-manufacturing industry, have certainly helped the Chamberlain Group, she went on. “People move around a lot from company to company, and as they’ve moved, people who have had good experiences with us have brought us with them as a resource for their new company.”

A Leg Up on Competitors
As he talked about how the company’s products are taken from a phone call to conception to the training facility, Eric Chamberlain, who handles the design and development aspects of the business, stared at his computer, equipped with 3-D design software.
There, he demonstrated for BusinessWest how a model begins to take shape digitally, with scanned images from CT scans or MRIs. And he used, as an example, actual patient data, specifically an individual with an abdominal aortic aneurism, or AAA, as it’s known in medical circles, for use in creation of a kit to train people in how to treat that condition.
“It occurs when … the aorta passes through the diaphragm, and down lower it bifurcates into the fenurals,” said Eric, exercising some of that knowledge of anatomy he has absorbed over the years. “Right at that bifurcation, the aorta loses its resiliency, and it bulges, and depending on how much it bulges it can be very dangerous, because it can burst.”
As he deftly manipulated his mouse, Chamberlain was able to isolate the bulging aorta and create a 3-D view of it. This piece can then be exported, he explained, and the company can make a mold for it, machine it with milling equipment, or 3-D print it using state-of-the-art technology that uses thousands of thin layers of powder which adhere together.
Using these processes, the company has created the ‘liliac artery approach training model for AAA stenting, with replaceable aorta’ and several hundred other kits involving individual body parts and systems that look and feel like the real thing, and, more importantly, provide invaluable hands-on learning opportunities for those who will use them.
And to ensure that the products provide those experiences, the company works closely with its clients — and immerses itself in a learning process — to gain the complete understanding of the anatomy, mechanical interface, and procedure subtleties necessary for the product to fulfill its intended mission — that aforementioned involved interaction.
Lisa Chamberlain told BusinessWest there is no five-year plan for this business, primarily because the industry, the technology, and the needs within the medical community are changing at much too rapid a pace for that, as their first 12 years in business have clearly shown.
“The industry has changed tremendously — the whole field of what is called health care simulation is in its infancy still, but it’s a whole lot bigger infant than it was when we got involved; it was really embryonic in the early days, and it’s now emerged as a whole new field in health care education, and we were just lucky enough to be a part of it.”
And because this pace of growth is expected to only accelerate as the infant continues to grow, the Chamberlains see a bright future for their venture, in work for both medical-device makers — who will need trainers on which residents and physicians can become proficient with their instruments and robots — and health care facilities that want to train individuals in an environment that is as close to the real thing as possible.
Which brings Lisa Chamberlain back to the subject of virtual-reality simulators, and her contention that they have only limited application in the health care field. “This is a pedal-hits-the-metal problem,” she explained. “When you have an instrument in your hand and you are touching tissue, if you don’t have appropriate haptic feedback [software that gauges applied force], you can negatively train.”
Harkening back to the Chamberlains’ special-effects background one more time, she said their experience in that industry revealed to them the limitations of computer graphics, something that fuels optimism about their future in business.
“So when the industry said that all this will go computer-based,” said Lisa, gesturing to the work being done in their shop, “we didn’t really think so, and in fact there is a shaking out of that process that’s going on right now.”
Drawing an analogy to the architectural field, she said that, while computer animation is allowing those in the profession to see and understand how a building will look and function long before it’s built, many in that profession still draw by hand on drafting tables.
“Traditional apprenticeship-oriented professions, such as architecture, such as medicine, have had an inherent resistant to change,” she explained, adding that this phenomenon — coupled with the rapid pace of innovation in surgical technique and, therefore, the need to continually train physicians and residents — adds up to opportunities for those making physical models.

Roll the Credits
Beyond the Ghostbusters poster, there are few reminders of the Chamberlains’ “other life,” as Lisa called it, creating special effects for Hollywood.
On one wall, there’s a map of the world with push pins in every country and state the company has penetrated. Meanwhile, other wall space is devoted to images of anatomy more likely to be found in a physician’s office.
But while they’ve left the movie business behind, they’ve taken many important lessons with them, especially that “propensity for invention” that Lisa mentioned.
It has served them well, and helped create a model of entrepreneurship and business success — in more than ways than one.

George O’Brien can be reached at obrien@businesswest.com

Ludlow Plastics Company Meredith-Springfield Builds on Its Reputation

Through most of his career in the plastics business, Mel O’Leary has kept a low profile.
Make that a very low profile.
Indeed, over the course of the past 29 years, during which he’s shaped Meredith-Springfield into one of the nation’s more accomplished blow-molding specialists, O’Leary has let the company’s products — actually, other people’s products, ranging from maple-syrup containers to detergent bottles — do the talking for him.
In recent years, though, he’s decided to be much more proactive when it comes to telling the Meredith-Springfield story, and he’s been helped tremendously in that regard by a recent project that put his company’s name and capabilities in some local press reports, but also publications ranging from Plastics News to Concrete World to Structural Engineer.
This would be the construction of the new, $220 million Miami Art Museum, which will make use of a new building technology known as the ‘voided concrete system,’ created by Milford, Mass.-based Cobiax Technologies. In a nutshell, the system replaces traditional concrete slabs with slabs featuring hollow plastic spheres — produced, in this case, by Meredith-Springfield — set into wire steel cages. Called the “light span-tastic” in one building-trades publication, the Cobiax system greatly reduces the amount of concrete — and thus weight — in a building, said O’Leary, while also limiting the number of view-obstructing columns, improving seismic performance, often reducing a project’s overall cost, and increasing environmental sustainability.
The technology has been used much more extensively in Europe, said O’Leary, noting that many architects and builders in this country are still taking a wait-and-see approach to the concept. If, after doing so, they decide to buy in, it could create a huge business opportunity for his company and perhaps expansion to other areas of the country closer to probable construction sites.
Holding one of the spheres, similar in size to a volleyball, aloft, O’Leary said that, while the product may look simple to the layman (at least when compared with some of the items in the company’s portfolio), it is somewhat complex. Meanwhile, manufacturing the large volumes needed for projects like the art museum is quite challenging, in large part because the spheres must be made of post-consumer (recycled) HDPE (high-density polyethylene) material, used for everything from milk bottles to auto parts, in order for a project to gain coveted LEED certification.
“Because this is an engineered product, the wall thickness of the spheres has to be very consistent and uniform, and that’s not easy to achieve in the blow-molding process,” he explained, adding that the spheres, which for this project were produced in several shapes and sizes, represent an example of how the company has gained a reputation for taking on, and carrying out, complex assignments, many of them now falling into the realm of helping clients become more ‘green.’
For this issue, BusinessWest takes a look at Meredith-Springfield’s involvement in the art-museum project, and how it exemplifies the new opportunities coming to a company that is finding it much more difficult to keep that low profile.

The Shape of Things to Come
Barker Steel, which has the North American rights to the Cobiax system, apparently didn’t know much about Meredith-Springfield’s reputation when it picked the company out of the phone book a few years ago when it was looking for a company to make the plastic spheres for a different project, one at Harvard that was eventually shelved due to the recession, said O’Leary.
But like other clients that have found the company through various methods — usually word-of-mouth referrals — Barker eventually arrived at the door with a problem, and an opportunity, in the form of the art-musem project, and Meredith-Springfield responded.
It’s been doing so since O’Leary, formerly a plant manager with AIM Packaging in West Springfield and then a consultant within the plastics industry, eventually started his own plastics company out of his garage. Over the years, the company has made a name for itself partnering with clients to bring to market everything from cushioning for athletic shoes to containers in which bone-marrow cells can be grown outside the body to fight cancer; from high-tech plastic globes used in place of glass in a chandelier for a casino in Macau to the recently introduced ‘extend-a-spout drainage system’ to ease the plight of homeowners suffering from foundation flooding from gutters and downspouts.
With all those efforts, and the Miami Art Museum project as well, the company’s MO has been to listen to the client and work with that party to create solutions to complex problems, said O’Leary, noting, again, that the sphere-manufacturing work tested the company in several ways.
“While it may look simple, it really isn’t — it was quite challenging for us to achieve the specifications,” he explained. “The challenge was furthered by having to use recycled materials, which in itself is a little inconsistent. And to get some consistency to it, we actually have to go search for something that’s a quality level we can work with.”
That search has yielded sources from New England to Alabama, he continued, adding that 50,000 pounds of recycled material were used for this project, which called for 30,000 spheres of varying shapes and sizes, the last of which were shipped to Barker Steel in late January.
There is vast potential for more work with Cobiax-related projects, said O’Leary, noting that the technology has tremendous potential within the building industry — and as a catalyst for growth in his company.
“There are a number of benefits to this method — for starters, you can design a building with larger spans and fewer columns,” he explained, “which appeals to exhibition space, stadiums, malls, parking garages, and facilities like that. And while it doesn’t necessarily lower the cost of the building, it allows longer spans, while lowering the carbon footprint, and helps in qualification for LEED.”
Architects and builders in Europe have been receptive to the concept, with recent projects in Warsaw, Frankfurt, and Milan, said O’Leary, but it has been slow to gain acceptance on this side of the pond, and some projects that were in the pipeline have been delayed by the recession.
The Harvard project he mentioned, a $2.3 billion science center, would have put the Cobiax system to use in four large office towers, but it was scuttled just before Meredeth-Springfield was slated to begin production.
“That was a double whammy,” O’Leary said, noting that Harvard’s decision not only back-burnered that project, but it kept others from seeing the Cobiax system at work and realizing its benefits.
The Miami project and all the press it has garnered in Concrete World and other publications is helping to build awareness, he said, and inquiries to Cobiax have increased tenfold. “Nothing’s imminent, but there’s much more activity than there had been.”
If this interest translates into more Cobiax building projects — and some are planned, such as a high-rise in Manhattan and a parking garage on Long Island — Meredith-Springfield may well have to rewrite its five-year strategic plan, said O’Leary.
“Right now, this is a small part of our business, but we look at this as potentially an entire business unto itself,” he said, “a whole division to support this, with possibly multiple locations.
“You couldn’t ship a truckload of this to California — you’d have to make it in California,” he continued, noting that shipping costs would be prohibitive and would detract from the product’s ‘green’ qualities by adding significantly to the carbon footprint.

Air Apparent
When and to what degree the Meredith-Springfield business plan is rewritten because of the Cobiax system remains to be seen.
For now, the new building technology appears to be a huge opportunity in waiting, and another chance for the company to further enhance its reputation for imaginative problem solving.
In short, it continues to expand its sphere of influence — in more ways than one — as it sheds that low profile.

George O’Brien can be reached at obrien@businesswest.com

A chart of the region’s largest manufacturers

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Printers Navigate a Time of Transition for the Industry

Commercial printers have more than weathered decade-old predictions that Internet-based communications would spell their doom, as companies of all types still rely on professionally printed materials. But this digital world still poses plenty of challenges for presses of all sizes. Area printers who are thriving and growing say they’ve been quick to adapt to new trends, such as ‘green’ printing and digital equipment, and say consumers inundated with e-mail and smartphone apps often simply crave something they can hold in their hands.

By JOSEPH BEDNAR

Reza Shafii disagrees when anyone says printing is a thing of the past.
“You need to change with the changes, but make the correct changes,” said Shafii, president of Northampton-based TigerPress, which will soon move its operations into new, 100,000-square-foot digs in East Longmeadow.
“Printing is here to stay,” he continued. “If you want to sell an expensive article like a Mercedes or Corvette, you’re going to need a nice book or catalog. Some things are going away — unfortunately, more people get their news from the Internet, and other things are converting to online, but there are still things being printed in the electronic age. If you know how to play your cards right, you’ll be ahead of the game.”
TigerPress has apparently played some winning hands lately, riding its heavy emphasis on ‘green,’ or environmentally friendly, processes and other innovations to a decidedly positive year, culminating in the purchase of a new printing press, the move to a new headquarters, and the planned addition of up to 50 employees.
“Right now, we’re looking for qualified people. We’ve already hired some press people, and we have a bunch of openings,” Shafii told BusinessWest.
“No matter how well you do, there’s only so much business to go around,” he added. “But there are fewer of us around these days — quite a few printers have shut down and gone out of business, so that’s another reason why we’re getting more business than last year. But we’re not looking back; we’re looking forward.”
Steve Lang, president of Curry Printing in West Springfield, is also in an optimistic mood.
“We just saw a very good summer,” he said. “Summer is a slow time for printing, but we experienced kind of an uptick that we’re very happy with. Right now, business is a little slower, but that has more to do with the recent storm than anything else.”
The economic slowdown naturally saw companies of all types scale back their marketing efforts and other printed endeavors, but those clouds have largely cleared at Hadley Printing in Holyoke.
“I think the worst is behind us for sure,” said Greg Desrosiers, vice president of sales. “I’m feeling a real sense that people are trying to be creative again. A couple of years ago, everything was on hold, but they’re definitely doing things again, which I think is a great sign. I definitely see improvement over prior years.”
This month, BusinessWest takes a look at how some area printers have weathered a recession and seismic shifts in the way consumers receive information — and why they’re convinced that printed materials still have an important place in the digital age.

Screen Time
Count Desrosiers among those who believe in the print industry’s future.
“A lot of people are realizing that print still has a very prominent place,” he said. “I think, when the recession first hit, a lot of people were quick to take a newsletter and just put it through Constant Contact. But I think they’re realizing it’s not always as effective as they think it is.”
One reason, he said, is an overload of data from digital devices.
“A lot of people have BlackBerrys and smartphones, and everyone’s on e-mail, so people think the more that’s put on e-mail, the better. But we’re finding that, sometimes, the more traffic travels through e-mail or a smartphone, the less attention it gets. People are so busy, and they’re getting abnormally large amounts of e-mail — it could be hundreds a day for some people — and if they don’t have time to read this newsletter, they hit delete.”
On the other hand, he said, a professionally produced print piece is actually a fresh option — one that might stay on someone’s desk longer than an e-mail might remain in a crowded inbox.
“We’re finding that, when you do something in print, it’s a fresh thing to look at, not like staring at e-mail or into a smartphone. Print puts something in your hands, and also allows you to read it at your leisure.”
Some innovations, he said, actually forge meaningful synergy between old and new forms of media. Take QR codes, those black-and-white boxes showing up on posters, printed materials, and other materials, which smartphone users can quickly scan and be brought to a Web site.
“QR codes are a perfect example,” Desrosiers said, of how the print and digital worlds can work in tandem. “People can print something for the marketplace, such as a magazine or catalog, and people can also scan that QR code, which may bring them to a Web site or YouTube. That ability to have something to read, then scan it and go somewhere else, is a wonderful thing.
“Six months ago, we didn’t print very much with QR codes; it was still in its infancy,” he added. “Now, we are printing with them on a regular basis. It can be a great combination.”
Even divorced from electronic media, Lang said, the print industry isn’t going anywhere.
“Ten or 20 years ago, people thought that letterpress printing was dead. It’s not; there’s still a niche for that,” he said. “Now it’s offset printing, and there’s a niche for that as well. Letterpress will always be around; offset will always be around. But digital printing, with shorter runs, has definitely taken over; you can see that with larger printers putting in digital operations in their print shops.”
That’s where Lang has focused much of his business at Curry; he’s also seen an uptick in digitally produced signs and other large-format jobs, a niche he has been emphasizing in recent years.
“When we’re serving somebody in an area where there’s not a lot of competition, it definitely helps us. Rather than the same old, same old, we’re kind of unique, and moving into digital printing has allowed us to focus on the signs. People who might traditionally go to a sign maker are now going to have it done here.
“Our next acquisition is a digital envelope printer, which we’re also excited about — single monochrome to full-color envelopes, done digitally, not offset,” he added. “Around here, nobody has that, and we’re seeing the need for it. People have nice letterhead, and in order to make their envelope match their beautiful letterhead, it can get quite pricey, unless they’re getting a great quantity done. We can do 500 or 1,000 envelopes in full color, affordably.”

Green Days
Across the printing spectrum, however, perhaps the most significant innovation has been a move toward ‘green’ printing. Shafii, who wrote and self-published a book on ecologically friendly print practices, has implemented many of them at TigerPress, from chemical-free plates to vegetable-based inks.
“We’ve been a pioneer in green printing, eco-friendly printing. We don’t just talk the talk; we walk the walk, and customers realize that,” he told BusinessWest, adding that such efforts have helped distinguish the company from competitors. “It hasn’t been just one thing, but a number of things we do differently. We’ve made a substantial investment, and we’ve been growing quite a bit. That’s not the same story everywhere else. We’re one of the few.”
Hadley Printing, like TigerPress and some other area shops, has earned certification from the Forest Stewardship Council, which recognizes companies that buy only materials that can be traced directly back to sustainably managed forests.
“We’ve had some huge green initiatives, and people have a lot of interest in that; it’s a strong segment of our business,” Desrosiers said, adding that Hadley has moved forward in other ways as well.
“We’re looking at some new pieces of equipment, potentially in the next year or two, that could help streamline some of our printing operations. It’s not something we’ve done yet, but we feel confident that the market has rebounded. We’re just concentrating on staying busy as much as we possibly can.”
It helps, he said, that fuel and material costs, which jumped at the start of the recession in 2008, have come back into line somewhat.
“The past summer was good as far as the cost of our materials,” Lang added. “Our suppliers have added a surcharge onto deliveries that have bumped prices up, and paper prices have been going up by a small percentage, but everything else seems to be holding. I haven’t seen that much inflation with supplies.”
The more challenging facet of the recession, Desrosiers said, was the fact that so many businesses simply cut back on print materials altogether.
“Spring of 2009 was when the stock market hit its low, and that’s when I think a lot of people put things on hold if they didn’t have to have it right away,” he noted. “Since that time, I feel like the trend has gone back up.
“Every business has been hit by this economy,” he continued, “and printers were hit hard right in the beginning. But I feel confident that the worst is over, and people are feeling confident again.”
And that’s news worth printing.

Joseph Bednar can be reached at bednar@businesswest.com

John C. Otto Focuses on Helping Clients Get the Word Out

Neil Brittman was sitting at his desk at the John C. Otto Co. in East Longmeadow with a book and pamphlet in front of him that show a butterfly in flight beneath the word emerging.
It’s the theme used by the printer’s parent company — Consolidated Graphics Inc. in Houston, Texas — at its annual conferences, where the latest innovations, products, and technology developed by their 70 companies are showcased. And that term ‘emerging’ speaks well to the progress the firm has made in recent years.
“What sets us apart from most printers today is that we have access to forward-thinking technology because of the resources we can utilize through Consolidated Graphics,” said Brittman, adding their affiliates are located in the U.S., Canada, Asia and Europe. “But with that said, we retain our own identity and want to be known as a local commercial printer. However, our business model differs from most family-owned independent printers. Since we are capable of utilizing our network of sister companies to satisfy our clients’ needs, we can provide anything they want.”
This includes what he refers to as “grand format” campaigns that can include everything from displays on buildings to catalogues, flyers, and other marketing materials. “What we do is extremely unique and no one else does it anywhere across the globe,” he said.
Brittman says the future of print is digital, and although Web and offset presses are still needed, they are becoming increasingly obsolete. “Digital presses provide the same quality at much greater speeds, which opens up opportunities for huge cost savings for our customers,” he told BusinessWest.
And it’s that combination — state-of-the-art technology combined with a commitment to helping clients save money — that has resulted in repeat business and long-term relationships. “Our work runs the gamut from people who give us one job a year to customers who have work for us every week,” Brittman said.

The Latest Word
John C. Otto Co. was established by a German emigrant in 1879. The company has evolved over the past century, but has undergone dramatic changes in recent years.
They include the acquisition of a Konica digital color press and the development of warehousing and fulfillment capabilities. It’s a service the East Longmeadow firm had never considered offering, even though Consolidated Graphics Focus has a large fulfillment house which sends out orders every day.
“Two years ago we had a customer who wanted to shut down their warehouse and asked us to take over that part of their operation,” Brittman said. Since the company is committed to doing all it can to accommodate clients, he decided to honor the request.
“It was an adventure and a learning experience,” Brittman said, as he talked about how Otto converted 5,000 feet of underutilized space in its building, set up a system of racks and developed programs to keep track of incoming and outgoing orders. “But it has been a home run for us and saved our customer hundreds of thousands of dollars.”
In fact, the success is so tangible that Otto is looking to restructure its production area so it add can another client that wants them to take over its fulfillment house.
The company has also been able to offer a unique product called “Flex Mailer,” which is very popular and was developed by a sister company in Rochester, N.Y. It is made from very heavy paper, with a three-dimensional frame inserted inside, which comes in a variety of sizes. The frame’s recessed interior allows booklets, small calculators, resource guides, small ring binders, or other promotional literature to be placed inside.
But what makes it remarkable is the design allows it to be mailed via the U.S. Postal Service instead of UPS or FedEx, which would typically be required when sending this type of material. “We have been doing mailings for Channing Bete Co. every month using the Flex Mailer and it has saved them thousands of dollars,” Brittman said.
The product is just one of the advantages that the research, development, and patents obtained by Otto’s sister companies offer. Another is Otto’s online Work Smart Suite.
It was formerly known as Storefront, but has undergone recent updates to keep up with “emerging” technology. “It is much simpler to use than Storefront and allows our clients to customize their products,” Brittman explained.
The program has three components. The first is called “Streamline,” and provides a place for companies to post business cards, letterheads, and stationery. Employees can access it at any time, which allows them to order materials whenever they need them, and even makes changes. “It streamlines the process,” Brittman said, adding that Otto has large clients who take advantage of the program.
The second component is called “Connect,” and it deals with direct marketing. It links personalized print with electronic media to produce advertising materials. “It can create direct mail campaigns for customers and do everything from sending personalized emails to direct mail and QR codes,” Brittman said.
The third asset is called “Organize,” and contains a myriad of options to help businesses organize their digital records and files. “It makes them easier to retrieve,” Brittman said.

Making an Impression
In the early years, the company marketed itself as “printers for advertisers.” And although its work today encompasses a very broad audience, their overall strategy has not changed, although the company has had several owners since it incorporated more than a century ago.
The Company’s facilities are located on land once used for farming, and a cistern well on the corner of the property wasn’t filled in until about eight years ago. “We were one of the first businesses in the industrial park when we moved here in the 60s,” Brittman said.
But as John C. Otto Co. has evolved, education has become an integral part of its service. “We want to make sure our customers are informed. In this day and age, everyone is looking for a price point, high quality, and a high level of service. So, we follow everything up in writing,” Brittman said. “We don’t leave any gray areas and want to make sure we confirm every detail of a job, whether it involves specifications, the date of delivery, or changes that need to be made.”
When the company acquires a large customer, it offers to review the client’s entire print budget to determine where and how it can save money. “By doing that, we can come up with an overall program for them,” Brittman said.
The strategy worked well for a client whose corporate office is in Connecticut. “They had seven entities across the nation and each one was working independently with a local printer. But the corporate office wanted uniformity in their reporting,” said Brittman, adding that Otto able to resolve the problem.
“We provide alternatives that will give people the highest quality in the most cost effective way, and that’s the premise of how we operate,” Brittman explained. “We are looking to find differences from what companies usually do, which can range from using a different stock of paper to a different type of planning.”
Otto’s corporate ties provide it with the ability to work with vendors across the nation and take advantage of greater buying power, which the company passes on to customers. “Consolidated Graphics is the largest digital printing company worldwide, so we can access anything that we don’t have here,” Brittman said.
That includes equipment, he continued, noting that a large area insurance company recently saved close to 50% on a job by using Consolidated’s digital web ink-jet printer. Such savings are especially important today, since many firms are no longer producing large quantities of advertising materials and storing them for future use.
“The days of long runs with huge inventories are starting to diminish,” Brittman explained. “Most companies are printing what they need now as opposed to a year’s supply; people just can’t afford to do that anymore.”

Final Account
The company prides itself on its sustainability, and is part of the Forestry Stewardship Council. It can provide recycled or post-consumable paper, which is partially recycled, to customers who request it and are in the process of converting their lighting to make it more energy efficient.
“Nothing here is wasted,” Brittman said, adding that their waste is baled and picked up by Georgia Pacific to be recycled. “So, we really are a very green company.”
Which goes hand in hand with Otto’s  efforts to save their clients money while providing the highest quality of printing possible. And like the butterfly that grows within a cocoon and is pictured on their literature, Otto plans to keep emerging and taking flight.

Hayden Corp. Continues to Find New Ways to Show Its Mettle

Hayden Corp. in West Springfield has been a model of industrial evolution since its founding nearly 90 years ago. This fourth-generation company started out serving the paper industry with machine components and later morphed into a metalizing specialist, applying coating that adds years to worn parts and equipment. Today, with thermal coating and laser-applied products, Hayden protects everything from nuclear submarines to oil-drilling equipment from wear and corrosion.

There are three portrait photos hanging high on the wall in the conference room at Hayden Corp. in West Springfield.
From left to right, they are Dan Hayden’s great-grandfather, Charles Elisha; his grandfather, Charles Wesley (everyone called him Wes); and his father, John, who together account for roughly 90 years of entrepreneurship, innovation, and business diversity — all traditions that Dan is continuing today.
Indeed, the company that started out making wire cloth for cylinder molds in the region’s many paper mills has been a study in industrial evolution over the past century or so.
Under Wes Hayden’s direction, said his grandson, the company started to handle a variety of different services for the paper industry, especially through a process known as metalizing, or the technique of coating metal to strengthen and protect it. Over the years, the process has benefited from new materials — as well as new techniques and equipment for applying them — but the basic principle is the same.
As the paper industry continued its decline in the ’60s and ’70s, however, John Hayden saw a clear need to further diversify the family business, and did so. He expanded the company’s reach into several new sectors, including the plastics industry, computer components, the pump and valve markets, sporting goods (golf clubs), and especially the military.
Hayden has handled coating work on a number of Los Angeles and Nimitz Class submarines, both at Quonset Point, Conn., where they’re built, and at Groton, Conn., where they’re repaired and overhauled.
“We’ve done missile-hatch doors, anchoring points, lots of valves, work inside the sail, in the reactor holds, all over the submarines,” he explained. “It’s been a good niche for us.”
And under Dan’s direction, the company, now with 36 employees, has diversified further in recent years through a large-scale investment in laser-cladding technology, used to coat and thus protect equipment used in especially harsh environments. Companies that drill for oil and natural gas have become the best customers for Hayden’s laser division, said Dan, adding that that other markets have been developed and more are being explored with the goal of maximizing the company’s sizable investment in this technology.
Today, Dan carries on in the tradition of the Haydens who came before him, meaning ongoing work to identify new growth markets — renewable energy and especially windpower could hold vast potential in the years and decades to come — and strategies for taking the company’s name to places it’s never been before, in both a literal and figurative sense.
For this issue and its focus on the region’s manufacturing sector, BusinessWest goes inside Hayden’s plant in West Springfield for a look at a company with plenty of history that, in many respects, continues to repeat itself.

Steeling the Show
As he talked with BusinessWest, Hayden pointed out the windows of the company’s conference room toward the front of the property. The half-acre or so of land was barren, with large holes in the ground where several 60-year-old trees toppled by the June 1 tornado once stood.
“It went right around us,” he said of the twister, adding that the falling trees shattererd several windows, and there was some roof damage, but nothing significant enough to close the plant. “The front won’t look like that for long … we’re going to plant some new trees and get some things growing out there.”
In many respects, that’s what the company’s been doing since Charles Elisha Hayden left a job with the paper maker Chaney Bigelow in Springfield and started his own company, which he called Hayden Wire Works because of its primary product, wire cloth for the paper industry.
As the evolutionary process unfolded over the next several decades, the name on the door was changed to Hayden Corp., said Dan, adding that a collection of several dozen photos in a room off the conference area tells the story of how the company became a pioneer of sorts in on-site spray-coating of paper-making equipment and machinery.
Wes Hayden was an avid photographer, and he took many shots in the field, Dan continued, meaning the plants where the company’s teams used early techniques in metalizing to lengthen the lifespans of metal machinery and parts.
“At that time, the company was going out and finding machine parts that had worn down and using metalizing to repair them,” he explained. “If you try to weld material, the metal will bend and distort, but if you use thermal spraying, you can build it back up without distorting, and that was my grandfather’s big selling point.”
Metalizing has come a long way since then, he said, noting that, in some cases, products are applied with heat and force supplied by what amounts to a rocket engine, and robots now handle the bulk of the sctual coating work in the plant.
The process is inherently quite simple, yet one of the many challenges Hayden and others at the company face is trying to explain how it works. “It’s a hard concept for some clients to wrap their heads around,” he said. “One potential customer asked, ‘how long does it take to dry?’ It’s dry when it’s applied — it’s molten metal.
“One of our challenges is to educate potential new users about what this technology can do and what it can’t do,” he continued, adding that the company is addressing this issue through participation in a number of manufacturers’ trade shows, including EASTEC, which has come to West Springfield the past several years, and also the annual FABTEC show in Illinois.
To illustrate just how much confusion exists about the company’s work and product lines, Hayden relayed a story from one of many projects at Electric Boat, this one involving organized labor.
“The aluminizing process that we apply to the submarines uses a combustion gun and aluminum wire, and we literally spray aluminum onto the parts we’re covering,” he explained. “From a distance, it looks very much like spray-painting because the aluminum is white. It happened that we were down there when the painters’ union was on strike, and we were given some hassle at the entryway because people believed we were scab painters.”

Metal Winners
While hard to explain and relatively unknown to those outside the client industry groups, the thermal spray-coating businesses is established enough to have its own trade group, the International Thermal Spray Assoc., said Hayden, and large enough for his company to record more than $6 million in sales annually.
That number has risen steadily over the years, as successive generations continued to develop new markets and new techniques. The latest manifestation of that tradition came four years ago, when Dan Hayden took the lead role in development of Hayden Laser Services (HLS). It was created to serve its still-primary client source — the oil and gas industry — and now accounts for between 10% and 15% of annual revenues. Explaining how the laser works, Hayden said it goes further than traditional thermal spraying, and is a more effective process for extremely harsh conditions.
“The thermal spray coatings that are the bulk of our business are mechanically bonded; they’re very tough materials, but they can be chipped away if they’re impacted or otherwise overstressed,” he explained. “The laser coatings are actually welded onto the surface; the process with the laser actually creates a weld bead, so the overlay materials become fully bonded to and alloyed with the substrate. This makes for a very durable, impact-proof coating, which is especially important with oil-drilling tools that go deep into the earth and see a lot of abuse.”
“It’s a small business unit,” he continued, referring to HLS, “but we have a good share of the market, and the market continues to grow.”
And while HLS has handled mostly oil and gas equipment, there have been some interesting exceptions, said Hayden.
“The unique combination of low heat input and true metallurgical bonding offered by laser cladding makes this technique ideal for repairing and restoring dimensionally sensitive components that have worn over time, and one great example is the steering worm from a classic Deere tractor that came into our shop recently,” he said. “The tapered bearing fits at each end of the worm had become pitted and worn, and the resulting sloppy fit made the steering box unusable. The particular worm gear had been manufactured on special equipment that allowed the sector shaft to follow a curved contact path on its spiral track through the worm. Not only are the pieces no longer manufactured, the unique equipment used to make them is nearly impossible to find. Restoration of the bearing fits would be the only way to recover the part.
“Using our three-dimensional scanner, we were able to create a model of the worn piece that we could use for programming,” he continued. “We applied a layer of stainless steel, using the tightly controlled laser metal deposition process, and ground the overlay back to the proper size to fit the bearings. The result is a piece that is good as new and ready to hit the road again.”
Looking ahead, Hayden said the search for new markets and new applications for the company’s many services is ongoing, with several growth opportunities identified in everything from light rail to the renewable energy fields.
“There is considerable potential in light rail handling rotating components — corrosion protection and wear protection on axels, bearings, and shafts,” he explained. “But there’s also room for more growth in oil and gas, and also renewable energy as well.”

All’s Weld That Ends Weld
Hayden said it will be some time before there’s a fourth portrait hanging in the company’s conference room.
“The hair will probably have to be gray before that happens,” he said, acknowledging that, in most cases, the portraits on the wall depict his predecessors late in their careers.
But while he hasn’t joined them in that respect yet, he has certainly carried on the tradition of entrepreneurship and diversification that has enabled the company to not only survive 90 years and several succession processes, but thrive.
As those portraits, and Wes Hayden’s pictures, show, the Hayden company is a shining example of perseverance and industrial creativity — in more ways than one.

George O’Brien can be reached at obrien@businesswest.com