Monalex Manufacturing, Inc. Receives ISO Certification

By Lisa Derby Oden

Did you know that there are over one million companies and organizations in over 170 countries that are ISO 9001 certified? Now there is one more. Monalex Manufacturing, Inc. located in Douglas, MA, has recently received certification in ISO 9001:2015. ISO 9001:2015 is a quality management system that includes the involvement and support of top management, a strong customer focus, a process approach, and continuous improvement. Monalex was able to achieve its certification with the help of MassMEP and the Workforce Training Fund Express Grant program.

Skip Brady is the Owner and President of Monalex, a company he started 28 years ago. “It started out with just me, and we’ve added as we went along and the business grew. We’re a job shop. We’ll take any job as long as it’s small enough to fit in the envelope of the machines. We make parts for lots of industries, and out of a variety of materials. Our parts are made out of metal, plastics, and sometimes wood and exotics. All the parts are custom made. We purchase the materials, though sometimes the customer provides materials, and shape and form it to customer specs until we get the final product. Our customers have been all over the world. We did a big job for EMC years ago, and also shipped products all over the world back then. Right now we’re not doing anything in foreign countries.  We do some work for different places across the United States, though most of our work is focused in MA, RI, and CT. We have some odd jobs that we do for customers in CA, TX, and AR, but most of our work is in the New England area. Currently, much of our work is for a company in the oil and gas industry. They sell safety products for oil and gas refineries and off-shore drilling. We also do a little medical device, some aerospace, rotary joints for antennae’s and satellites, and communication.”

What led Monalex to ISO certification? Skip continues, “I’ve always wanted to be certified. There are a number of industries – particularly aerospace, and even oil and gas – that require suppliers and vendors to be qualified. You do a lot by doing a good job for them to be qualified, for example in quality, delivery, and so forth. I’ve asked my customers over the years if needed to be certified and basically, they said no. It’s expensive to do so, and since it wasn’t a requirement, we ended up putting it off. About a year ago we determined we really needed to reach out and expand our customer base, and I thought getting ISO certified would help us in that regard. You get these little blips in the economy, you see a little slowdown, and you want to expand. I emailed a fellow I’ve known for years that works for a valve company in RI and asked him if there was anything we could do for him. He asked me if we were ISO certified. When I said no, he explained it was difficult for him to put us in for consideration without some sort of certification. So the light bulb went off and we talked about it in-house. We discovered MassMEP could help us and I put Monika on it. She’s done a great job with it, along with our Quality Manager as well.”

Monika Butler, the Administrative Assistant at Monalex, shares her experience. “I was new to the scene. Skip told me about MassMEP. I was just diving in without knowing what was going to happen. MassMEP came here and explained the entire thing to us, and that was very helpful. We knew what would come of our training and what was involved. We also learned that MassMEP would be hands-on.”

Monalex was certified a few weeks ago. “We’re looking forward to seeing where it goes, Monika continues. “We’ve updated our website and are working on some advertising in magazines. We’re excited to announce it and see what happens. Being certified has given us a lot more confidence as a company. That’s important – we all feel it. To have that level of confidence, especially when reaching out to customers, to know that things will get done with the excellence of quality that we want. It feels good to be able to say that.”

Skip concludes, “We have notified a couple of current customers and they have been thrilled! They have congratulated us and are more comfortable with us. It has shored up the foundation of our relationship, and that we are legit. We haven’t been worried about that because we’ve built our reputation over the years to certify that we are who we say we are. This just seals the deal. We were doing everything that ISO required, it just wasn’t polished. We didn’t have all the t’s crossed and I’s dotted. This improved our in-house processes to a great extent. It helped a lot with confidence building with employees – they know they are doing a good job because we are certified. We passed the test so to speak.”

To learn more about Monalex Manufacturing, Inc.: www.monalexmfg.com.