A look across the state at some innovative, growing manufacturers

By Joe Gardyasz

The Business Record perused the past year’s manufacturing expansions to come up with this trio of profiles of innovation and expansion.  

Operating in three distinct niches of the manufacturing industry, these companies range from a very well-known household name in Iowa — Pella Corp. — to others that may not be as widely known but are making a name for themselves. One of them has been around for more than a century: Percival Scientific, which fills a global niche as a supplier to the research facilities market. And we begin with a profile of startup company PVpallet, which is just beginning to shine in the solar industry. 

PVpallet’s recyclable, reusable pallets make solar sustainability shine  

Philip Schwarz and his three eco-entrepreneur partners have found the southeastern Iowa community of Montrose and Lee County to be a welcoming environment to grow their innovative packaging startup company PVpallet. 

Their company has developed a new recyclable plastic pallet system for use by solar cell manufacturers. The company’s product is aimed at replacing what Schwarz estimates are millions of pounds of wooden shipping pallets that end up in landfills after solar cells are unloaded at job sites. The fully recyclable plastic pallets also significantly tackle a breakage rate that costs solar companies tens of thousands dollars to replace broken panels. 

“I think waste reduction is very important, especially for a green industry,” Schwarz said. “For [solar companies] to be generating over 60 million pounds of wood waste that’s going into the landfill every year is just crazy to me. I love the idea [of recyclable plastic pallets] and we’ve been rocking and rolling on it ever since.” 

The Iowa Economic Development Authority in May awarded $350,000 in loans and tax benefits to PVpallet to build out an assembly and headquarters facility in Montrose. Lee County provided a 20% match through a $70,000 loan toward the project, which represents a $16.2 million capital investment by PVpallet. 

The idea for the product was conceived by co-founders Luke Phelps and Steven Kottwitz. Phelps, who had owned a solar installation business in northern Missouri, quickly realized that after each installation he needed to haul away dumpsters full of wood pallet waste, which was also creating labor inefficiencies and safety issues for installers. 

Phelps and Kottwitz knew from experience in the ag industry that most seed companies had switched from cumbersome single-use feed sacks to reusable plastic containers. “So they asked, ‘Why aren’t we doing that in solar?’ and that was the genesis of the idea,” Schwarz said. “Luke ran the concept by me, and I just loved it.” 

Every pallet is made from recycled plastic — “so it’s a fully circular, sustainable manufacturing approach,” Schwarz said. The largest plastic pieces are injection molded by a subcontractor in Ohio, and the hardware components are sourced from a variety of companies in Iowa. Everything is shipped to PVpallet’s facility in Montrose, where the company does all its assembly and order fulfillment.  

The company’s six-person staff all works remotely, with the exception of one employee in Montrose. This fall, PVpallet plans to hire three additional employees in sales, administrative and assembly roles. Over the next three years, Schwarz projects hiring at least 26 more workers in Iowa for a variety of roles as it builds out its Montrose operation. 

The feedback from the industry has been phenomenal, he said.

“We go to trade shows and all day long we hear, ‘Oh my gosh, finally — I’ve been waiting for this solution for years.’ No one else is doing this — we are the first reusable, recyclable, collapsible container for solar, and it’s something the industry has needed for a long time. The timing is fantastic — everybody these days is talking about sustainability and waste reduction. And now with the Inflation Reduction Act that’s been passed, there’s a huge push to bring more domestic solar manufacturing to the states.” 

Percival Scientific supplies researchers globally with controlled environment chambers 

An innovative Iowa manufacturing company based in Perry is a leading provider of specialized controlled environment chambers used by corporate and government research institutions and biotechnology companies around the world. 

Percival Scientific, founded in Des Moines in 1886 as Percival Manufacturing, originally made refrigerated food display cases. In the early 1950s, the company created the first commercially available plant growth chamber, which it developed for Iowa State University. The company now designs and manufactures more than 150 different models of research chambers, which are being used in all 50 states and in more than 80 countries.  

“Our customer base is worldwide,” said Gary Wheelock, president and CEO of Percival Scientific. “We sell all over the world, to people doing research in crop and animal science, microbiology and genetics. We’ve sold into the biopharmaceutical and biomedical markets; basically anyone who wants to do research in a controlled environment are our customers.” 

To accommodate its growth, the company began planning for a 33,000-square-foot expansion of its Perry manufacturing facility in the fall of 2019. But just after it had contracted for work to begin, “COVID reared its ugly head,” Wheelock said, and the project was put on hold until early spring 2021. 

“The original building footprint is about 60,000 square feet, of which about 53,000 is production space. As we have grown as a company — and in particular growth in large walk-in project work — we needed more space to assemble and test them,” he said. 

“As we were looking to add production space, we also looked at the need to have some additional automation in our space, such as cutting and bending machinery to help with refrigerator assembly work. We’ve already purchased one robotic welder, and are looking at getting two additional robotic welders. So having the additional floor space also helps with that capacity.” 

The company received two $1 million, zero-interest loans through the U.S. Department of Agriculture Rural Economic Development Loan and Grant program. Percival worked closely with Minburn Communications, CIPCO, the Iowa Area Development Group, the city of Perry and Perry Economic Development to apply for the loans, design the building plans and secure additional financial assistance. Perry Economic Development provided a $75,000 grant to help offset land purchase, and the city of Perry provided tax increment financing.

With the expansion, Percival Scientific is adding between eight and 10 additional people to its production staff; it currently has about 80 employees. “Before our expansion, we really didn’t have room for additional employees,” Wheelock said. 

The company is experiencing a larger than normal backlog of orders currently, due to residual impact of the pandemic. Also, lead times for getting some parts have gone from four to six weeks to 16 weeks or longer in some cases, though that has started to come back to normal, he said. 

“A lot of our products we sell are being used in research about climate change, getting crops more tolerant to drought and increasing the food supply,” Wheelock said. “We feel privileged to provide chambers to help combat climate change. We’re a small part of that, but pretty proud of it.” 

Focus on employee retention brings national recognition to Pella Corp. 

Pella Corp., which employs more than 4,500 of its 10,000-plus team members in Iowa, was recently recognized by Forbes magazine as the No. 1 company in Iowa on its 2022 Best-In-State Employers List. Earlier this year, Pella was also named a 2022 Best Workplace for Innovators and Most Innovative Design company by Fast Company. Additionally, the manufacturer was named one of America’s Best Large Employers in 2021 by Forbes. 

The company’s Iowa workforce is located across the state, including its mile-long headquarters campus in Pella as well as its locations in Sioux Center, Carroll and Shenandoah. 

Last year, the company shifted production of its wooden windows from a plant in Macomb, Ill., to its facility in Shenandoah. In adding the new production lines, Pella invested an additional $5.6 million in the Shenandoah plant and pledged to add 120 workers, which have since all been hired. As of September, the plant now employs 550 people in a town of less than 5,000 population. The company received a $200,000 forgivable loan from the Iowa Economic Development Authority for the project.  

Moving the production of Pella’s wood lines from Macomb to Shenandoah also enabled the company to streamline and ramp up production of vinyl products at the Macomb plant in Illinois, “which means an increase in jobs at the Pella plant in that community as production increases to meet demand,” said Nicolle Picray, a senior public relations manager with Pella.

The company’s average team member tenure is 14 years, with more than 1,700 employees inducted into their Chairman’s Club for 25 years of service since the program began in 1989. Pella attributes the retention to its caring culture as well a focus on career development for everyone. Competitive benefits such as retirement contributions that do not require an employee match are also contributing factors.  

Last fall, Pella Corp. hosted an Iowa Business Council “Vision to Vitality” community forum at the New Horizon Academy, a 190-child child care facility that the company has helped fund. Supporting quality-of-life projects is vital for employers to attract talent, particularly in rural communities, said Pella’s president and CEO, Tim Yaggi. 

“Prospective residents aren’t just looking for a job. They are looking for a community to thrive in,” Yaggi wrote in a December 2021 guest opinion piece in the Iowa Capital Dispatch. “That’s why the company has invested in numerous community projects in its headquarters town, among them Liberty Street Kitchen, the Prairie Ridge neighborhood and South Main townhomes. 

“While physical improvements to our community infrastructure go a long way, we must also focus on being welcoming and inclusive to new residents,” Yaggi wrote. “It is one thing to recruit people. It’s another to make newcomers feel comfortable and included. Whether that family is from another state, or another country altogether, our collective success depends on inclusion.”