(Editor’s note: This is the 13th installment in a monthly series highlighting some of the region’s unsung manufacturers that make products essential to the economy and, in many cases, our way of life. See previous installments here.)
Fasano Corp. has thrived for decades by focusing on a tiny niche in the manufacturing industry. Literally, the company makes tiny things.
On the shop floor in Cranston, Ron Fasano Jr. walks proudly among the precision Swiss-type machines that can pump out massive numbers of minuscule, intricate parts with little margin of error.
“We have always worked in a certain niche,” said Fasano, whose grandfather founded the company in 1972. “We like the small stuff.”
The manufacturing technology has evolved – while some of the machines first used when the company started are still working, other computer-controlled machines are now making parts. Still, the specialization in things that are minuscule has remained the same at Fasano since the beginning: the company can make thousands of parts in sizes as small as less than a millimeter.
Operating in a simple brick building off Elmwood Avenue, three generations of the Fasano family have been part of the legacy, filling orders that can reach 10,000 units of bushings, fuel injection or brake system components, optical equipment or medical implants.
Fasano grew up around the shop, working summers and after school, learning the ropes of his grandfather’s business.
The founder of Fasano Corp., the late Albert Fasano, worked into his 90s, operating the older-style Torno cam-driven screw machines that required much more finishing work on parts afterward. A few of those screw machines are still operating inside the 4,000-square-foot facility, which has conversion charts hanging on the wood-paneled walls, old maps and microscopes at every station.
Fasano’s father, Ron Fasano Sr., can’t part with the old machines that gave Fasano Corp. its start. “He’ll never get rid of them,” Ron Fasano Jr. said.
In other ways, the company embraces modern mentalities.
The company aims to be environmentally conscious, extracting cutting oils from 100% of the scrap chips left behind in the manufacturing process before they leave the facility for reuse; all excess metals are sold for other uses.
Capital upgrades have made jobs easier and more proficient. The computer numerical controlled machines may cost more than $200,000, but they run up to 10,000 revolutions per minute and are equipped with a feature allowing machining from both sides.
While Fasano regularly secures contracts from medical, automotive and electronics companies, the customer base has expanded in recent years, according to the elder Fasano. The company has picked up more jobs from aerospace industries and firms such as Lockheed Martin Corp.
Fasano Jr. declined to disclose the company’s annual revenue.
Fasano only has eight employees and half of them are family members. Mary Fasano, the company matriarch, has run the office for over four decades, managing the books and keeping up with the ever-changing federal compliance rules that come with defense contracts.
“There is no research and development [team] here,” she said.
Indeed, but Ron Fasano Sr., president, says the company is not stuck in its old ways, either.
The latest industrial revolution known as “Industry 4.0,” referring to “smart” and connected production systems, has added to the amount of technical expertise required to stay current.
“That is something you have to force yourself to get involved in,” Fasano Sr. said. “You must embrace it, or you are going to fall behind. You don’t want to be surprised.”
You won’t see any billboards with the smiling Fasano family or commercials of them singing a catchy TV jingle. The company doesn’t budget for advertising, counting on word of mouth and industry relationships sustained over a half-century.
“We rely on our reputations,” Fasano Sr. said. “So quality is key.”
Supply chain snarls and inflation have hit the company, as they have all manufacturers.
Some materials can take more than a year to arrive, and the price of materials, such as beryllium copper, continues to rise. Fasano Sr. estimates that the cost of all materials has jumped 50% this year.
The Fasanos are thankful they held back from taking on any debt, as other companies did when interest rates were low and borrowing was cheap. They’ve spent money on new improvements but when they had their own money available.
“We’ve invested quite a bit over the years because we had to. It’s tough to stay current, especially when you are small,” the elder Fasano said.
Fasano Sr., who estimates it takes over a year to fully train a new employee, says more state investments in job training programs and grants have helped the local manufacturing sector. The complexity of the machinery requires a cross-section of technical knowledge. Both Fasano and his son have degrees in industrial engineering.
“More people are understanding the value of the trades now,” he said.
While there are regional competitors from Boston to Hartford, Conn., Fasano doesn’t have many rivals in Rhode Island, he says. Many of the screw machine shops have been bought out by larger corporations.
Fasano has had offers, too. But he likes where the company is.
And with the growth of technological innovation, Fasano Sr. says the public perception of the machine shop industry is changing.
“They are not thought of as grease shops anymore,” he said. “At least most of them.”
[gallery link="file" size="medium" td_select_gallery_slide="slide" ids="447646,447647,447648,447649"]
