Managing the “COVID Crazies” in metal fabrication

North Carolina job shop Barnes MetalCrafters has been handling what Manager Nick Martin calls the “COVID Crazies” better than expected. Getty Images

Has anyone felt the intensity and work load increase in their shop during this COVID-19 pandemic? I keep hearing about this manufacturing shortage in America, but I am having a hard time seeing it. I’m sure some businesses and fields have had a drop in action, but fortunately we have seen a surge. In my head I have been referring to this as the “COVID Crazies” and I can’t help but think about Duke basketball.

Have you ever heard of the Cameron Crazies? You don’t have to be a basketball fan, or even from North Carolina where I’m from, to appreciate the intensity of this group of people. They are the student section that supports the Duke Blue Devils men’s basketball team during home games. I’m not even a Duke fan, but my wife and her family are. To go along with that, I end up watching a handful of games and they are typically enjoyable. Without being a fan, I still appreciate the history and the nostalgia of their basketball program. Not to mention that their coach, Mike Krzyzewski (aka Coach K), is the pinnacle of success.

So, thinking about the COVID Crazies and the Cameron Crazies, I made the connection that they are also referred to as the sixth man by the coach, the Coach K.

So, as a metal fabricator, who is our sixth man right now? I guess you could say it’s stainless steel. Duke’s sixth man is notorious for bringing an energy into the room that propels success. When the pandemic initially set in, we were unsure of many things. Having enough work for the shop was one of them. But the work started trickling in, and several jobs we received were directly related to COVID-19.

Stainless steel is obviously used in sanitary environments. Customers began giving us orders that were going in new plants or upgrading old applications that were to be held to higher requirements. We literally watched our shop go from 50% capacity to 100%+ in roughly a week's time.

Right when the pipeline of work flow was filling up at the shop, one of our TIG welders approached us and put in his two weeks’ notice. There wasn’t much we could do about it since his family was moving out of town. Needless to say, we went hunting to fill the position within 10 to 20 minutes after he informed us of his decision.

Around that time we moved another team member, Corey Harr, who did a lot of MIG welding and fabricating, to strictly TIG welding. It was a different animal to tame but he was up for the challenge. To fill the void at his station, we hired a MIG welder and trained him the best we could while keeping the flow going. This was definitely a sink-or-swim situation for the new hire.

The amount of work was getting overwhelming and our guys were given the freedom to work as much overtime as their hearts desired. Stay late, come in on the weekends, you name it. But our guys were having a hard time keeping up with the TIG welding overload and we needed more help.

On the flip side of having plenty of work at our shop, some facilities were letting people go because they didn’t have the work. We reached out to a recruiter and found a welder who was let go because of this very reason. This guy's previous experience was mainly working with stainless steel for the same industries we were making parts for. He literally slid into this position as if he had been here for months. The guys were quickly finding out what kind of work they could give him and how much he could handle.

To be honest, I’ve barely gotten to know him over the past month or so because his helmet is always down or he is finishing out welds. Work is getting done and he definitely helped the flow. So who is complaining? We even had our secretary Gail Stallings out in the shop peeling the protective film off the corners of parts that needed to be welded. This is a very tedious task that most welders don’t like to do.

Stainless Steel chute assemblies that require all welds to be ground smooth inside. We have to assemble these in stages so ease the ability of getting tools inside to complete the job. Image provided by Nick Martin

Like many shops, you take the help when you can get it. We are keeping our fingers crossed that this will keep flowing for several more months, considering we are in an election year. Typically, there is a dip in the economy shortly after the big election day. Hopefully the next president, whoever it is, will push manufacturing and let it trickle down to the smaller guys like us.

For now we will keep riding the wave of the COVID Crazies. I will try to keep my sanity, but if I see a college kid on the shop floor, painted blue, running around in their tighty-whities, I may need to take a day off.

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