For more than three decades, Piselli Enterprises President and Founder Rich Piselli has helped his customers find quality new and used gear-manufacturing machinery, many times offering those customers equipment right off the production floor.
Used gear equipment is one of the most cost-effective approaches to manufacturing in the gear industry, according to Piselli. As technology continues to evolve at a rapid pace, along with its price, there exists a great opportunity in the used gear machinery market to provide a similar product at a fraction of the price of new equipment.
To that end, many of Piselli’s customers in need of gear equipment can be found across the border in Mexico, and Piselli’s ability to more efficiently meet those customers’ needs has been somewhat limited — until now.
December opening
On December 1, Piselli Enterprises opened up a new facility in Monterrey, Mexico, in order to streamline the services Piselli is able to offer his customers.
“We’ve seen quite a large increase in our Mexico presence and our sales,” he said. “We’re looking at an initial warehousing plan with growth potential as well as full services for our technicians for some of the larger corporations in the area where we do business.”
With several of the companies Piselli Enterprises services having relocated to Mexico, it just made sense to add a Mexico facility to better serve them, according to Piselli. It also will help maintain the successful relationships he has developed with companies native to Mexico.
“They do business a little differently than we do here, and it’s given us an opportunity there, with some local representation, to really infiltrate the market,” he said. “And as we increase our sales base there, we’re going to pretty much do there what we do here in the U.S. out of our Statesville, North Carolina, facilities.”
Industry buzz
The news of the expansion has been generating a lot of buzz within the industry, according to Piselli.
“The market response has been exceptional. We have alerted several of our customers of the fact that we are going to be doing this expansion, and it seems to have created a bunch of interest and commitments that we’re trying to fulfill for our different groups,” he said. “We don’t want to expand too quickly; however, in this day and age, a lot of the companies have asked for outside service in regards to machine maintenance and technical support. It takes time to find the right people, but we’ve got a good core group right now, and we hope to expand it when we find the right key people and not grow too fast where we can’t control it.”
Piselli Enterprises’ Mexico expansion will offer everything the U.S. locations do now, according to Piselli.
“We’re going to have, of course, technical support and service for the machines that we sell,” he said.
Convenient to customers
Piselli added the facility will also allow customers to see some of the machines without having to travel outside of Mexico.
“It lets us show equipment under power, so customers can touch it and feel it without just having to go by photos and video,” he said. “It’s going to allow us to have our people trained more on the machines that we sell more consistently, thus making our service and technical support more defined and more effective.”
The new facility means Piselli Enterprises can offer machines beyond gear-cutting equipment as well.
“Many of our customers have asked for gear equipment along with other types of lathes and machine centers that we don’t normally sell here in the U.S. out of our Statesville facility,” Piselli said. “This will allow us to give a broader grouping of machines that they can use and be able to purchase from us directly. Basically, it’s more full service in their own backyard, and that’s really the key. It’s hard to service machines from the U.S. that are in Mexico and vice versa — the travel, the delay, the time that it takes. By having something closer to the customers themselves, it’s going to allow us to be much more productive and that much more beneficial to them.”
By having equipment housed in an exclusive facility, it also helps to ensure contact with customers — as well as answering their questions — is handled in a much more efficient way in order to better conduct business with that part of the business community, according to Piselli.
“With our own warehouse facilities, we can get these items taken care of and the questions answered quicker, so we can cut to the chase faster,” he said.
And the ability to quickly assist a customer is key, especially with more mid-range sized companies relocating to Mexico, according to Piselli.
“We’re seeing a lot of growth down there,” he said. “A lot of our U.S. corporations are setting up facilities and expanding operations in Mexico. I mean, they have been for many, many years, but it seems to be more of a universal thing now for a lot of mid-range companies as well. The big boys always did it, but the medium-size and mid-range companies are doing that now, and there just seems to be a bigger need for that equipment and that type of service.”
Enhancing existing services
The expansion will only serve to enhance the services that Piselli has offered for more than 30 years. He has owned several manufacturing companies across a portfolio of industries including mining, automotive, and off-highway.
Each of those industries required different types of gear-manufacturing equipment, and when a customer comes to him with a need, he said he can provide a solution with the experienced knowledge necessary. Typically, Piselli is able to address a customer’s needs with his vast inventory — an inventory that will only get larger with his expansion into Mexico.
“We’re able to source, rebuild, repair, and maintain high-quality used gear equipment,” he said. “Because of our vast experience in the gear industry, our network enables us to address a variety of our customers’ needs quickly and efficiently.”
In addition to his vast inventory of gear equipment, Piselli Enterprises is also heavily involved in the auctioneering business.
“It just gives customers another option,” Piselli said. “It’s for customers with not only gear machines, but for those with other types of equipment, a smaller plant, a line of product that’s not specific to gear cutting, or additional operations like lathes and mills and turning and machining. This brings in our auctioneering expertise and contacts where we can offer a way for them to sell their equipment in that product line. That allows them a better opportunity to find the best qualified buyer, which, ultimately, leads to a better purchase price of their equipment.”
