Suspension manufacturing company Hellwig Products is looking to hire more staff to its Visalia plant
VISALIA – Suspension manufacturing company Hellwig Products is looking to add members to the team at its Visalia factory.
Melanie White, CEO of the fourth-generation family-owned California company said she’s looking to add to the team culture at Hellwig.
“There’s no ‘I’ here,” White said. “We really have to rely on each other…we’re looking for qualified people that want to join a great team environment.”
White said there’s a variety of positions open at the suspension manufacturing company right now, from hands-on to office or a hybrid of both. Currently Hellwig is hiring the following: tech writer; research and development engineer; receiving; packaging; and machine operator.
While the company was founded in 1946 down in Southern California, White’s grandfather moved Hellwig to Visalia in 1967, just after Highway 198 had become a highway.
“It’s been a great place for us straight off the freeway here,” White said. “His vision was to expand here, and we’ve definitely been able to do that with property, but also team members.”
White said COVID-19 has been a strange time for Hellwig. She said the ongoing supply chain issues have definitely been a challenge for a company that deals with steel.
“We have more inventory than we’ve ever had before,” White said. “We’re having to order more to make sure we have it, and way further in advance. Some of our order times are up to 15 weeks, when they were only three to four weeks [pre pandemic]. It’s like playing Wack-A-Mole trying to make sure that our pipeline is filled to take care of our customers.”
White said there’s been ups and downs during the pandemic—they’re looking for workers seemingly like many other businesses—but the early days that shut down and scared off airline travel created an unexpected bump in business for the suspension company.
“Those European vacations turned into, ‘I’m going to buy an RV and I’m going to travel,” White said. “That really turned into something good for us…as vehicles are built our product goes on the vehicles for RV chassis as well. That part of our business picked up.”
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