Since our founding in 1960, we’ve grown from a small commercial fastener manufacturer into a global supplier serving distributors across a wide range of industries. Today, more than 20% of our business comes from international markets, including Germany, France, India, Taiwan, Israel, and Australia.
As Dan Bielefield, Vice President of Sales, reflects, “If you brought the founders of Crescent Manufacturing to the plant today, they would recognize the equipment and maybe even a couple of the operators, but they would be astounded by the breadth of our product line and how far our parts travel around the world.”
Our 20,000-square-foot expansion is another exciting step in that journey. It gives us room to grow, improve how we operate, and build on more than six decades of manufacturing experience.
Expansion Benefits
One of the biggest benefits of our expansion is improving how parts move through our manufacturing facility. Currently, parts travel between different production areas during manufacturing. The new building will allow us to reorganize our operations to create a more direct, streamlined production flow that will improve efficiency and reduce unnecessary movement between departments. Approximately 40% of our more than 100 machines will be relocated to the new building. Much of this space will be dedicated to secondary manufacturing processes, including threading and slotting, along with a new shipping and receiving area.
The expansion will also allow us to bring more raw materials on-site from our off-site warehouse to support growing demand for aerospace fasteners. At Crescent, our lead times range from 40 weeks to more than 90 weeks, depending on the part, diameter, and manufacturing processes required. Having more raw materials readily available should help reduce downtime in our heading department, keep production moving, and give us greater flexibility to respond to customer needs.
Ultimately, these improvements will help us manufacture more parts, work more efficiently, and get more products out the door for our distributor customers.
Steve Wilson, Chairman of Crescent Manufacturing (left) with Chris Case, Project Manager for Borghesi Building and Engineering
Equipment Investments
Alongside our facility expansion, we’re looking at new manufacturing equipment to increase capacity and expand our product offerings. One area of focus is multi-die headers, which would allow us to manufacture more complex fasteners more efficiently. With growing demand for our NAS6600 product line, these machines could help us increase production and potentially introduce additional fastener series, including NAS1351 and NAS1352, which we don’t currently manufacture. We’re also exploring opportunities to replace older heading equipment with newer, faster machines to improve production output.
Positioning for the Future
There’s a lot of opportunity ahead for the aerospace industry. Aircraft manufacturers are working to increase production to meet demand for commercial aircraft, while regional and private aviation markets continue to grow. Our expanded facility gives us more room to invest in equipment, improve our manufacturing processes, and take on new opportunities as customer needs change.
For us, this expansion is about much more than adding space. It’s about finding better ways to work, expanding what we can manufacture, and making sure we’re ready to support our customers as their businesses grow.
Beyond equipment and production improvements, we’re also focused on developing the next generation of skilled manufacturing professionals.
Thank you to the outstanding team at Borghesi Building and Engineering
“The expansion is part of Crescent’s plan to stay nimble and agile as we meet growing demand across the market. We are also looking to expand our apprenticeship program to develop the next generation of craftsmen at Crescent, along with other processes that will help us produce more quality parts for our customers,” Dan shared.
We’re proud of how far we’ve come since 1960 and everything we’ve built along the way. We’re excited about this next chapter and look forward to continuing to grow alongside the customers and industries we serve.