We are very excited to announce that we moved all operations back to Gettysburg, PA at the beginning of this month! Why? To improve production! How will the move help? Keep reading for more details!
More About the Move:
Firstly, you need to know that we have been actively planning this move since the end of last summer. This move was not a rushed decision or something we did without careful consideration. Actually, when we took over all manufacturing a couple years ago, the advantages of moving back to the East Coast became apparent pretty quickly but the timing never seemed right. With costs continuing to rise, shortages and delays becoming more frequent, and more recently our rent in Idaho nearly doubling, it became the right time to move real fast.
Thanks to pre-planning we kept parts running and were shipping orders until the last minute. The shop was packed up in only a week and we were expecting an additional 2 weeks to get everything up and running again. There have been some surprise construction delays here in Gettysburg, so that wasn’t able to happen quite as planned. Fortunately, the internet is finally set up now, so we can get back to doing regular updates, start catching up on emails, and most importantly: print shipping labels!
Without any internet access we’ve been pretty quiet recently, but that doesn’t mean we haven’t been staying busy. The CNC mills are all tuned up and ready to run parts, the Blanchard grinder will be under power and ready to work in the next day or two, and the water jet will be ready for action next week. The engraving, assembly, and shipping benches are all in place and knives are working their way through production again. For the concerned cat lovers out there: Yes, we also have Jasper’s cat tree set up in a sunny South facing window.
Why We Moved:
The same reason we do anything, improvement! Many companies have responded to the current economic situation by raising prices, lowering quality, cutting benefits to hard working employees, or some combination of cost saving tactics to increase their bottom line. Here at SURVIVE! we decided to try something dramatically different. Rather than passing along rising costs or lowering standards to increase our profit, by moving the business where it can be maximally efficient, we can maintain our pricing and quality, while also improving availability.
Once we took over as a full manufacturer we realized that in addition to Peters’ Heat Treating, many of our raw materials and consumables come from the East Coast. Being back in Pennsylvania will dramatically cut the production process time for each batch, while also reducing costs and risks. In addition to all of the awesome East Coast vendors we’ve already been working with, being back in Pennsylvania has opened up tons of possibilities that simply did not exist back in Idaho.
That's all for today's update but stop by often, we have a lot happening and we're so excited to share every bit of it with you. One of our next videos will feature Peters' Heat Treating, when we head up to drop off the next batch of blades!
See the new SURVIVE! Workshop over on our YouTube Channel!