By CASEY NEILL
A DANDENONG company is offering an Australian-first service in a bid to double in size.
A and A Electroplating owner Mark McHale this year invested $360,000 in new equipment to introduce zinc nickel to the company’s zinc plating services.
“We corrosion-resist steel parts for various industries,” he said.
“We need to diversify for us to get stronger, try and create a new market.
“If it doesn’t work, I’ll be ringing you up for a job. If it does work, we’ll be laughing.”
Mr McHale’s is a manufacturing success story, and not the only one in Greater Dandenong according to Committee for Dandenong spokesman Todd Hartley.
“It’s not all doom and gloom in the region’s manufacturing sector,” he said.
“I speak to many customers and suppliers on a daily basis and I get the feeling things are really ramping up for a big year.
“We still are the manufacturing hub of the country.
“Although we are losing the automotive industry over the next three years, we still have a presence of truck, bus, caravan and rail industry original equipment manufacturers in the south east region who are all currently increasing their build rates.”
Mr Hartley said Chisholm Institute’s enrolments and student contact hours had increased dramatically over the past 12 months.
“We have an institute in our own backyard that is supplying the training and skilling of our staff to keep the region world-class competitive,” he said.
“What’s not to get excited about?”
Mr McHale is certainly excited about the next six to 12 months.
“We’re doing a new thing no-one in Australia does, called zinc nickel,” he said.
“They do barrels, for screws, but no-one does a still line.
“We’re in the process of putting that in now.
“Currently we do zinc, which gives you a couple of hundred hours of salt spray or corrosion resistance.
“Galvanising is the highest you can get, it’s a really rough finish. Zinc nickel will give you the same smooth finish (as zinc) but a greater salt-spray resistance.
“That could be our bread and butter and zinc could become 20 per cent.”
Mr McHale bought A and A in 2010.
“The guy I bought the business off was my one employee,” he said.
“I now have eight full-time staff and two part-timers.
“We’ve grown 30 per cent, every year, on top of each other.”
He said diversification and customer service were the keys.
A and A uses about 60 per cent less water following recent innovations.
“The electroplating industry is a very old industry that in the years no-one’s ever said ’where are we going to be in five years’ time?’” he said.
“They’re worried about here and now and making their money and getting out.
“They never put money back into the process, never try to improve the process to make it more efficient, try to make it more economical … ”
Mr McHale said the company’s quality and service was talking.
“We’ve got great relationships with all our customers,” he said.
“They know they can ring us on a Friday or a weekend and say ’we’re in the shit, can you get us out of the shit?’ and we’ll say ’no worries’.
“I can’t beat your Chinese price, but give us a shot – I’ll give you quality and service.”
He said businesses might be purchasing a product for 10 cents in Australia and find it available for two cents in China.
“They don’t factor in that now you’ve got to buy 400 million of these,” he said.
“You pay up front 30 days, not 60 days after. You have to pay for warehousing and transport.
“That two cents is probably eight cents, so you’re probably saving two cents.
“And you never know, with a call to the supplier you might be able to haggle two cents out of it.”
Mr McHale compared the business dealings to buying a hamburger from a milk bar.
“You can’t go to China and say ’I want one hamburger with the lot, one hamburger with cheese, one hamburger with beetroot’,” he said.
“You’ve got to order millions of the bastards.
“Here, we’re a phone call away. That’s how we can beat China.”
