After working for another manufacturing company for 8 years , Wilmer landed a contract to start building cattle trailers and over the years built a reputable name for himself and his company in terms of quality and deliverability . As the business was growing Loewen realized that all the new technology that had been developed in recent years would now provide the perfect platforms for building a wide variety of trailers in a very efficient way .
“ Technology allows us to create products to the highest standards possible which is our focus first and foremost said Loewen . I would prefer to build fewer trailers to our high standards , rather than just churn out a product that will ultimately let the end user down , it ’ s just bad business and I want our brand to be known for being the high-quality products they are ”. The biggest change is their ability to use different designs and parts for all their trailer lines . “ Our CNC laser cutters , plasma cutters and press brakes allow us to form our own part of the trailer instead of relying on the basic structural steel available for the trailer market while keeping the quality we insist on , something we would have never been able to do years ago . Being able to add different designs allows us to change the look of the trailer and give them kind of a sporty fresh look instead of the same old square box ”.
The technology doesn ’ t end with the building of the trailers , Raw Maxx has included the most up to date systems available across the board , in fact when moving from their 80k sq . ft . facility to their new 216,000 sq . ft . facility Loewen and his managers Alan Castillo and Jason Sawatzky worked with their in-house engineers and drafters to design the lay-out of the new facility . “ Everything flows exactly the way it should ” said Loewen . By empowering the people who will be ultimately responsible for the production schedule they were able to place equipment in a way to keep a smooth and steady flow of all the product lines . “ We couldn ’ t be more impressed with the job they did said Loewen ”.
They even embraced technology for after the sale . Let ’ s say your customer bought a trailer a few years ago and one of the fender wells was accidently bent , no problem , simply retrieve the VIN number off the trailer , call or go online to RawMaxx and using the VIN you will be able to order any part for any trailer even if they don ’ t produce that exact model any longer . Each VIN has the original C . A . D drawings attached to its history and since all the components are made on computer operated systems , any replacement part can be exactly re-produced at any time . continued on next page
www . natda . org NATDA Magazine 25