Two unrelated manufacturing stories:

Stertil-Koni USA, Inc., a manufacturer of heavy duty truck lifts and bus lifts, has announced that its factory in Streator, Illinois has just produced its 2,000th unit made in the USA.  The particular product coming off the assembly line was Stertil's ST 1082 Mobile Column Lift, which is capable of lifting up to 18,000 pounds.

Machine-tool builder Mazak Corporation is expanding production at its Florence, Kentucky plant. The company said it will increase the plant’s potential output to 200 machines per month by the fall of 2013.  Mazak reports that while demand had stabilized in 2010, by April 2011 it had increased output to 150 machines per month, and is now further ramping up production.

What do these two stories tell us?

While Stertil-Koni's plant is located in Illinois, and Mazak is in Kentucky, both companies are seeing a continuing demand for their products.  It's nice to know that U.S. manufacturers like Stertil can produce heavy machinery-- a niche, non-consumer sector that relies on skilled work and heavy metalworking.  Similarly, Mazak's success in the machine tool arena means that the U.S. is not entirely dependent on foreign suppliers for the building blocks of industrial production.

The U.S. is still struggling to recover from a recession that severely affected the nation's industrial sector.  Let's hope that companies like Stertil-Koni and Mazak point the way toward a wider recovery.