Kent Foundry Co. * Controlled Unless Printed *

Kent Foundry Co. * Controlled Unless Printed *

Title:
Company Profile / Document Id:
Q-000-002 / Effective: 5/18/2016
Version: 3 - / Page: 1 of 2
Status: Published

Note: You should also visit our website: www.kentfoundry.com

We are ISO 9001:2008 registered. We are working on being 9001:2015 registered.

Our History

Kent Foundry was started in 1943 to produce grey iron castings by Earl Houghtelling at 617 Butterworth Street in Grand Rapids, Michigan as a green sand foundry. On October 16, 1966 the company was incorporated.

In 1968, his son Leslie Poorman took over the company and expanded the operation to include a facility at 514 Butterworth Street also, which consolidated the operation from several rental facilities. The company continued to grow, adding equipment and modernizing every few years. In 1970, Kent Foundry became one of the first in West Michigan to install electric melting equipment, replacing a cupola.

In 1978, Leslie’s son, Gerald Poorman took over ownership of the company, and Kent Foundry continued to grow. In 1980, the facility was expanded to more than twice its size by construction of a building addition onto the 617 Butterworth facilities. This addition added the addition of no-bake molding for floor molds and a shot blast machine for shakeout and casting cleaning. The company also expanded its cleaning room, by pouring a concrete floor on the entire 1st floor of the 514 Butterworth facilities, adding a truck dock and modernizing its equipment. 1982 saw the end of all green sand molding, with complete conversion to no-bake molding. 1982 also saw the first ductile iron castings poured at Kent Foundry. In 1986, the melting equipment was upgraded to the latest in induction melting. All the while, the company continued to expand its customer base and sales.

Now along came 1989 and a look into what the future held. The two pieces of property were aging and it was time for something else. So there was much planning done, and finally the decision was made to build a new facility. After a lot of research, it was decided to move to Greenville, Michigan. Kent Foundry shut down operations in Grand Rapids on January 29, 1993.

Greenville facility:

On February 15, 1993, we started production at 1413 Callaghan St., Greenville, Michigan.

We moved approximately 60 % of the equipment that we started up with, while purchasing the other 40 % new.

Here in this Greenville facility, we have grown and added building 3 in 1995; expanded the grinding room in 2000; added building 4 in 2005; and building 5 in 2006.

We have added equipment and production methods. All at the same time, adding a quality policy in 1996, continually upgrading and applying our environmental, and safety and health policies. We have continued to grow, seek different markets, and better ourselves.

Of natural consequence, when 9/11/2001 came about, the industry as a whole suffered greatly and Kent foundry suffered also through these times. However, unlike many foundries, we focused on our strengths and came through a winner.

Through this time, we studied the business climate, the marketplace and the global economy. We as a company decided that to continue to compete and improve our operation, we needed to expand our vision more to grow for the future. So among other things, we set out to develop an ISO 9001:2000 quality program, become registered with it, and grow as a company by implementing it and improving our operation.

We received registration to ISO 900:2000 on March 7, 2008 on our first audit, and have found ourselves a much better company, since it has strengthened all areas of our company.

On March 16, 2009 we were registered to the ISO 9001:2008 standard.

In 2016, we are working on getting our ISO 9001:2015 registration when we are re-audited in January of 2017.

Currently, we are growing, planning more modernization of equipment, adding equipment, people and more space as needed to our facility as our customer base grows.