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A job shop story about diving in head first

Yesterday I spoke with Jim Mauro, managing member at Spring Hill Fla.-based MicroFab LLC. Mauro is a longtime industry veteran, but he hasn’t had a typical career path.

His father was a tool and die maker (which isn’t unusual for many in this field, of course). In the 1970s he left high school and found work at a fab shop, where he learned the business from his boss, a German who also happened to have sheet metalworking in his blood. “He was really tough, but he was really fair,” Mauro said. “He taught me a lot, and I really honed my skills there in precision sheet metal. And from there I went on to land great jobs at some of the best companies—Hewlett Packard, IBM, Grumman Aerospace, Northrup Aerospace, among some others. Every time I went from one company to another, I took the skills that I learned and got better and better at it.”

That part isn’t unusual.

He then joined an aerospace company in Florida that just wasn’t a good fit, and so Mauro saw an opportunity to start a company of his own. Friends, family, and industry colleagues all knew he did good work, and soon his new job shop started getting work from good companies.

This company wasn’t MicroFab LLC but another shop Mauro had managed with several business partners, who eventually grew the company in a different direction, which wasn’t a good fit for Mauro, so he left to launch another job shop. Because of some personal circumstances, he eventually sold that company, entered the corporate world, and started a business brokerage.

That part isn’t entirely unusual either. Business partnerships change; life happens; and M&A isn’t a bad business when you consider the money involved, especially after dealing with years of tight margins that for many job shop owners now are just a fact of life.

But then recently he decided that he needed to get back into manufacturing and launched MicroFab LLC. Why, exactly? “I have a burning desire to do it,” he said. “I get tremendous satisfaction out of making something.”

He added that when work is all about money, it brings everything down. If money is all that matters, the worst of human nature comes to the fore.

In metal fabrication—especially at small, privately held shops—money quite often isn’t front and center, which makes sense. People can make a lot of money in this business, enough to be very comfortable, especially if they’re in the right place at the right time. But if all they care about is making a lot of money, metal fabrication isn’t the easiest way to do it.

Nevertheless, it can be extremely satisfying, mainly because it’s not about the money. It’s about talking to people, uncovering a better way to make something, and diving in head first to make it happen. The result can make some people wealthy, but immense wealth was never their intent. For them, it’s the journey and the act of diving in head first that makes life worth living.

About the Author
The Fabricator

Tim Heston

Senior Editor

2135 Point Blvd

Elgin, IL 60123

815-381-1314

Tim Heston, The Fabricator's senior editor, has covered the metal fabrication industry since 1998, starting his career at the American Welding Society's Welding Journal. Since then he has covered the full range of metal fabrication processes, from stamping, bending, and cutting to grinding and polishing. He joined The Fabricator's staff in October 2007.