Greensburg, PA, November 14, 2011 – General Carbide Corporation, a manufacturer of more than 50 grades of tungsten carbide tooling for a variety of cutting and metal forming applications, recently invested nearly $2 million in new production equipment, including
CNC vertical machining centers and lathes. The machine tools will enhance General Carbide’s shaping capacity, allowing the company to meet the needs of customers worldwide who require tooling for numerous applications, including rotary cutting dies, general metalforming, oil & gas flow control, stamping die components, large PM dies and rooftile production. In conjunction with improvements to its manufacturing capabilities, General Carbide has begun using a SyteLine business operating system for enterprise resource planning (ERP), and new hardware to support its information technology (IT) and engineering activities.
Each year, the company invests more than $1 million in capital improvements. Over the next 12 months, General Carbide plans to purchase a new CNC press that will strengthen its abilities to press and sinter higher-volume parts with greater accuracy than ever.
“I am pleased that the company is in a position to make these significant upgrades for the future,” says Mona Pappafava-Ray, General Carbide’s owner and president. “The fact that our sales have been strong since late-2009 is a testament to the hard work and dedication of our management team and production staff. In addition to being excellent at what they do, they are great people to be around. Our customers appreciate the innovative thinking, technical expertise and personalized service that differentiate us from competitors.”
The “Secret” of Success
General Carbide has weathered the recession without choosing to lay off any employees. Instead, Ms. Pappafava-Ray reduced salaries and wages from 10 to 30 percent, including her own, between October 2008 and September 2009. This bold decision was a risk, not knowing how long the recession would last. She knew, however, that a long-term comitment to her employees would pay off when business conditions improved, largely due to the management team and production employees working aggressively to develop new business opportunities when production levels were low.
The financial implications were great, and a slow recovery would have been detrimental to the bottom line, and to the company’s survival. Instead, General Carbide has been well-prepared to take advantage of new opportunites due to the workforce remaining intact while many competitors have cut their employment levels, or have gone out of business altogether.
In appreciation of employees’ loyalty during difficult times, Ms. Pappafava-Ray gave back part of the salaries and wages in December 2010 which were sacrificed in 2008-09, providng an unexpected “Christmas bonus” to the company’s salaried employees. As orders continued to climb during the first half of calendar year 2011, Ms. Pappafava-Ray gave back the remaining amounts of salaries and wage cuts in mid-June of this year, pleasantly surprising employees once again by completely repaying them for their lost wages.
About General Carbide Corporation
General Carbide Corporation manufactures more than 50 grades of tungsten carbide tooling for a variety of cutting and metal forming applications. The company was established more than 40 years ago and is headquartered in Greensburg, PA, near Pittsburgh.
General Carbide employs more than 200 people and has annual sales of nearly $30 million.
For more information, contact Tom Shearer at 724.836.3000, x113, or 724.493.2436 (mobile). E-mail trshearer@generalcarbide.com or visit www.generalcarbide.com
