Milwaukee-based Pflow Industries Inc. has purchased a 26,000-square-foot building across the street to make room for growth.
The company, which makes vertical lifting equipment, purchased the property at 6667 N. Teutonia Ave. from Grafton-based Atlas Iron & Wire Works Inc., which previously occupied the building. The purchase was about $500,000, and included both the property and some equipment inside, said David Dux, vice president of marketing at Pflow.
“We’ve had quite a banner year and the last two years have been fairly busy for us and we’ve kind of run out of space in our main building here, and we’re kind of looking for space to expand,” Dux said.
Pflow has found a niche in building lifts for observatories to move lenses. Its Cartveyor product, which allows shoppers to take an escalator with a cart, has also been popular among retailers.
“Our business could never go to China because it’s not a commodity,” Dux said. “Every one of the 600 or 700 lifts we build a year is custom made.”
If a big observatory lift order from Chile comes through, the Cartveyor product line will likely move to the new space to make room at the existing 140,000-square-foot plant at 6729 N. Teutonia Ave, Dux said. Some inventory and research and development will also be housed in the new building, said Tom Sowinski, vice president of operations at Pflow.
Pflow has added about 45 employees since 2011, and now employs about 135, Dux said. The expansion will not result in new hiring.
