Manufacturing in the U.S. expanding in Illinois: The case of GAM Enterprises

GAM Enterprises employee profile: Mark

Title: Sales manager for U.S. east coast and Canada

Background: Mechanical engineer from Pennsylvania State

Years with GAM Enterprises: Five

Day-to-day: Outside sales and support for representatives and distributors

Take on GAM culture: This is a smaller family-owned business with a culture that gives employees a lot more empowerment than larger manufacturers. “Because of that, there’s more shepherding of sales orders from quotations and drawings and sales support to the final support in service. In fact, all parts of a job funnel through sales with one point of contact for the customer, for better service overall. Some big manufacturers might not prioritize say, an eight-piece order — but we do … and can handle large, medium, and small orders with our infrastructure.”

Take on GAM capabilities: Understanding of GAM’s manufacturing capabilities is paramount to GAM’s engineering knowing what it can sell. “When I started five years ago, we didn’t have the capabilities we have now. But today, the value-based sales we make are based on the specialized offerings we have in-house — and because we recently cut our lead time to five days, those standard products need not make our customers wait.”

GAM can take standard product and customize standard products quickly and affordably.” So for a given customized product, a competitor might make a customer wait 10 to 14 weeks for delivery and charge twice the price. To get that customized part from GAM, they might see just an extra week of lead time and a 15% increase in price.”

Profile from on-location coverage: Manufacturing in the U.S. expanding in Illinois: The case of GAM Enterprises