The Manufacturing Express headed north to the Great Lakes to pay a visit to the air compressor capital of the midwest: Michigan City, Indiana, home of Sullivan-Palatek. The company’s iconic orange air compressors of all sizes were on display today as employees, community leaders, and students from the A K Smith Career Center came out to learn about and celebrate the incredible manufacturing done right here in northern Indiana.
Founded 40 years ago as Palatek Corporation Concept to supply engineering services to existing air compressor companies, the company has only grown as they’ve become a trusted name in the air compressor industry. In 1998, the company merged with Sullivan Industries, a portable air compressor company. This led to the company renaming itself Sullivan-Palatek, combining both the electric and portable compressor companies. Ten years later, Sullivan-Palatek opened its doors here at their 170k square foot Michigan City campus, and has grown ever since.
Air compressors provide a number of important functions, such as providing clean air for building HVAC units, powering tools like jackhammers, or even filling tires. Here at this facility, Sullivan-Palatek supports roughly 200 jobs, with an estimated 900 jobs supported through vendors across the region. The company manufactures their own rotors right here in Michigan City, and assembles their air compressors onsite using pieces manufactured by partners across Indiana, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin.
In order to assemble these many air compressors of this quality, it requires a strong team. And no one understands that better than Sullivan-Palatek president Bruce McFee.
“You need to depend on a lot of people,” McFee says. He’s also quick to tell you one of the things he’s the proudest of about Sullivan-Palatek, and it’s not just the best portable air compressor in the industry. Only 20% of the staff has a college degree. Sullivan-Palatek believes the work they do, both on the shop floor and in the office, does not always require a college degree to do but is really about hard work.
That’s why the company was so excited to invite students from the Compressed Air Academy at A K Smith Career Center to today’s event. It’s a core part of Sullivan-Palatek’s philosophy that opportunities be created for people to start family-supporting careers here in Michigan City without a four-year college degree. This approach has gotten strong support locally from the Mayor Angie Nelson Deuitch, who has a background in the trades herself.
“These are good-paying jobs” Mayor Deuitch told the students in attendance, “Everyone can make a good livable wage and afford to be here without going to college.”
The companies that are successful are the ones that build from within. As a family-owned company with no outside investors, no one understands this better than Sullivan-Palatek. Thanks to their continued efforts to develop talent from right here in Michigan City, it’s clear that northern Indiana will stay the air compressor capital of the midwest for generations to come.
