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Creative Automation Celebrates 40 Years!
"From the decisions we make in engineering, to the quality of the machining and fabrication on the plant floor, when the people building the equipment are making the best decisions and implementing the best ideas, the equipment performs the best! This is the heritage of Creative Automation."
Purpose-Built Equipment
Tom Streckert is passionate about excellence. In 1971, Streckert founded Creative Automation, seeing an opportunity to provide high quality, purpose-built manufacturing equipment for the wood industry—an industry he was very familiar with from experience in his family's door manufacturing business.
Seeing the struggles faced by manufacturers trying to utilize generic equipment that didn't quite fit their specific application, Streckert set out to build a company that would build what the customer actually needs instead of expecting them to adapt to what was offered.
The More Things Change...
When Creative Automation opened its doors, there was very little specialized machinery in wood production, and much of the existing generic equipment performed poorly, often not meeting expectations.
Now, 40 years later, those same performance issues still plague some equipment manufacturers, but not Creative Automation. One thing this company is known for is their ability to design and build purpose-built equipment that consistently performs to specification 24/7/365.
Three More Standout Qualities
For every company there are a few significant qualities that make them stand out from the crowd. From the beginning, Streckert set out to help wood processors in America compete on the world stage, and he knew automation was key to that success. Three more things stand out as significant to Creative Automation's enduring success: Build Quality, Innovative Ideas and Immediate Support.
Build Quality
One thing that has set Creative Automation apart has been their unwavering commitment to doing things right. Welded structural steel is used in all machinery (as opposed to bent sheet metal). Mating parts all have CNC machined surfaces for accurate fit. And all machines are designed to be indefinitely rebuildable. These are "long-view" values, and help Creative Automation equipment to last.
From day one, Creative Automation made a commitment to a high level of intuitive design and stringent build quality. Without these ingredients, machines that are used the way wood processing machinery is used simply could not stand the test of time.
Innovative Ideas
For Creative Automation, the idea is 'king'. Thinking creatively and logically has enabled Creative Automation to solve major production challenges for customers. Using the most proven technology of the day, Creative Automation has developed customized manufacturing solutions that have been both efficient and surprising in their simplicity. Most of all, their ideas have proven themselves through rigorous everyday use in plants throughout North America.
Creative Automation's leadership is evident in every piece of equipment produced. They were one of the first in woodworking to integrate modems into equipment for remote diagnostics and support. Part number stamping on every custom part was pioneered by Creative Automation, enabling faster and more precise part replacement.
And Creative Automation understood early-on that the best means for arriving at the ideal equipment solution for processing lines is to connect the engineer directly with the customer throughout the project development phase. The idea of eliminating the layers of bureaucracy has been a value held dear at Creative Automation for their entire 40-year history.
Immediate Support
Clearly one of the features appreciated most by Creative Automation customers, the commitment to immediate support, is above and beyond anything in the industry. Creative Automation commits the actual engineers of the equipment to tech support, and their machining and fabrication department makes replacement parts a top priority— often making a needed part the same day for a customer. Their ability to provide that level of service comes from building some of the toughest, most durable equipment in the industry. They simply do not need to have a large tech support department because they simply don't get that many calls.
Our Greatest Distinction Lies in Dedicated People
"All of us at Creative Automation are proud of what we have been able to provide our customers for the last 40 years," concluded Tom Streckert. "We sleep well at night knowing we give everything we've got to our product and to our customers. The fact that there are so many talented people here enables us to raise the bar with every machine we build."
If your processing environment is due for an upgrade, contact Creative Automation at 715-223-6321 to begin discussing how Creative Automation processing and material handling equipment can improve your production reliability and workflow.
The 40-year success story for Creative Automation centers on the talented people who have made this Midwestern company a leading developer of innovative material handling and processing machinery.
From the most seasoned veteran to the most recent addition to the team, talent and innovation have, and will continue to make Creative Automation a valued partner for the wood and related processing industries.
In the late 1970's, Creative Automation installed the first of eight door feeder/stackers in a customer's midwest plant. Now, 34 years later, the machine pictured is still in operation.
Creative Automation has always stressed functional simplicity in all our designs. This is one reason Creative Automation equipment lasts as long as it does, while providing peak performance year in and year out.