Artistic Manufacturing—A Business Bringing New Ideas to Church

• Jeff Eckhoff

The shelves in Randy Monk’s Altoona, Iowa, office are lined with the artifacts of decades past. At one corner sits a stack of the stamped metal ashtrays Artistic Manufacturing Corporation once produced as a sideline. A few feet to the right, you’ll find one of the small, decorative metal pots that the company made and sold to florist shops until the 1960s. In between those historical outposts sit older versions of the crosses, cups, and communion plates that have been the bulk of Artistic’s sales for more than 50 years.

Cleaning Cobot is Coming to Miracle Tool America

• Jeff Eckhoff

Dozens of times each day, the skilled workers at Miracle Tools America in Davenport must stop what they’re doing and clean. Making drill bits can be a dirty business, and the tiny water channels that are used to keep tools cool have a tendency to get clogged.

Hence, the company decided to begin experimenting with a new type of employee – one that wouldn’t mind the monotony.

One who is made of metal.

Learning the Rules of the Federal Sales Game

• Jeff Eckhoff

Selling your product or service to the federal government can be a confusing prospect: You catch a glimpse of what appears to be a lucrative future sitting on the horizon, but the path to that goal is blocked by a confusing mass of questions that need to be answered before you can get there.

Good Managers Solve Problems for People, Speaker tells CEOs at ILC Power Breakfast

• Jeff Eckhoff

Maintaining competitive advantage in a growing business is a lot like finding yourself in a leaky rowboat 10 miles from shore, Jim Lancaster told members and guests of the Iowa Lean Consortium (ILC).

Business leaders tend to focus most of their energy on putting out the daily fires, Lancaster said. But a company can easily stagnate if no one works to push the operation toward a distant goal.

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