American Dream

/ American Dream #1  

EverythingAttachments

Elite Member
Joined
Mar 12, 2009
Messages
4,770
Location
Newton NC
Tractor
Which One do you want to know about?
I hope everyone recognizes EA as the most transparent and approachable company with the best customer service in the industry. If not, please try us!

The dream is alive and the struggle is real. Our dedication to designing, creating, and providing you with the best tractor attachments money can buy is ongoing.

We stay going because of increasing demand and we stay behind because demand has grown faster than our ability to build the product...

This was written by Ted a couple of months ago and posted in the Everything Attachments Channel group.

Good morning to all the EA group. I just wanted to share a little bit about how lead times are working...
I know this is a painful subject but needs to be addressed. Growing pains are real and they hurt both of us. We lose orders and our valued customers are not getting what they need when they need it. There was a day a few years ago when we had a pile of attachments and just hoped we could build the EA brand up to sell them. I will never cut corners to be able to keep up production or make it easy to build. I have been using every attachment we build from many of the best brands from the time my dad would let me on a tractor. Besides the lawn mower when I was about 6 years old, my first start was on a YM135 Yanmar in 1972. I was 8 and loved it. Through the years, I destroyed many attachments and 3 point hitch parts at my dads expense. Now, it is my goal to build the best attachments on the planet so you guys don't have to worry about destroying them. This does not mean they cant be bent or destroyed if not used correctly, but we engineer them to have the best design for the intended use. It is our intention to make them out perform all others and be as affordable as possible.

The sad thing is... We have the equipment and just paid for the old factory we were leasing that is just sitting full of lasers and every thing needed to do twice as much, BUT WHERE DO WE FIND GOOD SKILLED WORKERS THAT WILL WORK. ?? There is little room to train a worker to make YOUR attachments to our standards. It seems no one these days wants to work. We are constantly hiring at Everything Attachments, but between people that can't do the job and won't come to work, that is our biggest challenge. We start no one below 15 dollars per hour and most make 20 plus plus.

I LOVE MADE IN THE USA, BUT IT IS A REAL CHALLENGE. MY GOAL IS TO SAY IT WILL SHIP IN LESS THAN 3 DAYS. We will not quit till we get there. I have been working harder than ever in my life to 6 AM till 4 or 5 PM then go home a think the rest of my day on how to fix this great problem. Thanks to all of our awesome EA CUSTOMERS!!!
Ted Corriher.
 
/ American Dream #3  
We have the same problems here. But many business owners are still doing extremely well. Expensive paid for houses, cottages and vehicles, yet will not pay their people much more than industry wages.

Would paying more, get positions filled?

I read that in physical jobs, paying more, get's you more. As the job get's more complicated, paying more actually has negative results, according to several studies.
 
/ American Dream #4  
I just got my EA 78 inch eXtreme box blade last week. It was a long wait, but worth it! The quality is everything your video said it was. I have done a couple of projects with it so far, and I am very satisfied.

My son lives in New Hampshire and his neighbor there has three EA pieces for his Kubota - a rear blade, a grapple, and a land plane. I have examined all of these and they are great quality as well.

You guys are on the right track. Keep up the good work and best of luck with the new factory!
 
/ American Dream #5  
Ted, we have similar problems with machinists. Can find any off the street so we train them up and they leave.
You do have the "good" problem of having to much business and how to grow efficiently without loosing the impatient customers. I would suggest looking for a few good engineers (my bias since I'm a manufacturing engineer) who can help "lean" out your processes and automate were it makes sense. Looking to reduce lead times, WIP and bottlenecks.
Good luck!
I am probably going to be ordering a tiller soon to do some fall planting.
 
/ American Dream
  • Thread Starter
#7  
I just got my EA 78 inch eXtreme box blade last week. It was a long wait, but worth it! The quality is everything your video said it was. I have done a couple of projects with it so far, and I am very satisfied.

My son lives in New Hampshire and his neighbor there has three EA pieces for his Kubota - a rear blade, a grapple, and a land plane. I have examined all of these and they are great quality as well.

You guys are on the right track. Keep up the good work and best of luck with the new factory!

Thanks for the business and encouragement, Dennis! We're starting to see some improvement in efficiency already.
It's very cool to see this stuff being created.
Travis

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/ American Dream #8  
Perhaps you set up in the wrong area. There are places around the country where people are hurting for work.
 
/ American Dream
  • Thread Starter
#9  
Perhaps you set up in the wrong area. There are places around the country where people are hurting for work.

Maybe so, but we can't really pack it up and move! We'll keep our eyes on the prize and get there.
Travis
 
/ American Dream #11  
Nice welds on that mower, Travis! Thanks for posting the factory pics.
 
/ American Dream #12  
As the cost and availability of high skill labor continues to rise...the writing is on the wall...
It won't be very long before a lot of American dream produced products are going to end up being made by AI robots mostly made in China and elsewhere...

[edit]

When I say "...made in China and elsewhere" I was referring to the robots not the products...

[/edit]
 
Last edited:
/ American Dream
  • Thread Starter
#13  
As the cost and availability of high skill labor continues to rise...the writing is on the wall...
It won't be very long before a lot of American dream produced products are going to end up being made by AI robots mostly made in China and elsewhere...

Not as long as we're still in the game! :drink:
Travis
 
/ American Dream #14  
Not as long as we're still in the game! :drink:
Travis

The question is can you stay competitive with ever increasing labor costs? your products already sell at a premium (based on quality). How much more can you increase the retail prices and remain competitive?

With everyone starving for quality help the labor market rises in value exponentially...it will become a free agency bidding war for high skilled mechanics, engineers etc., etc...
 
/ American Dream
  • Thread Starter
#15  
The question is can you stay competitive with ever increasing labor costs? your products already sell at a premium (based on quality). How much more can you increase the retail prices and remain competitive?

With everyone starving for quality help the labor market rises in value exponentially...it will become a free agency bidding war for high skilled mechanics, engineers etc., etc...

I think time is our main competition when it comes down to it. I can compare most any attachment we make to a competitors and justify the difference in price if we're higher. If price comes up, EA prices are frequently lower than items guys are looking at locally anyway, and we provide a much better product to boot. I'm not talking TSC, RK, Northern, etc because there's really no comparison there. Honestly, our customers rarely bring up price or product comparisons...they know they want EA when calling. We are very fortunate in this regard and have worked very hard to get it here. I owe SOOOO many thanks to our proud, loyal customers out there who show this stuff off and recommend EA.
Travis
 
/ American Dream #17  
Ted, why not utilize some welding robots? It seems like your business is perfect for that.
 
/ American Dream #18  
Ted, why not utilize some welding robots? It seems like your business is perfect for that.

I would assume the issue is the high cost of fixtures for the robot. The cost for the robots is bad enough but designing, building, storing the fixtures is costly. EA makes lots of different equipment and the next stages of growth are giant steps.
 
/ American Dream #19  
I would assume the issue is the high cost of fixtures for the robot. The cost for the robots is bad enough but designing, building, storing the fixtures is costly. EA makes lots of different equipment and the next stages of growth are giant steps.

Could be a concern, but if he started with his highest volume items it could take some of the load off of the other stuff. Also, not every weld on a given item would need to be made by the robot. It seems like if the item was tacked together by the manual welders it would be fairly easy to fixture for the robot to do most of the longer welds. Should be able to get a lot more production from the labor he is able to get!
 
/ American Dream #20  
My business is precision machining and we have customers and vendors all over the country. Everyone in our industry is fighting a losing battle with regards to labor. It doesn’t matter if you are in a big or small area, you are going to struggle with finding people. Good luck Travis, I know all to well what your challenges are.
 
 

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