Concrete is the construction material that never takes a day off: it’s durable, reliable, and versatile. It’s no surprise that the folks who make industry-leading concrete batch plants possess those same qualities. Here at ASTEC CON-E-CO in Blair, Nebraska, 180 local men and women are manufacturing the machines that keep our country as strong as the concrete they pour.
The July sun made its presence felt as the Manufacturing Express rolled into ASTEC CON-E-CO’s Blair facility on Friday morning. Blair sits just across the Missouri from neighboring Iowa and only a few miles upstream from the big city of Omaha. But the summer weather was no obstacle to the day’s celebration of the local equipment manufacturing community; ice-cold soft drinks and rock music made for a warm coming-together.
ASTEC CON-E-CO has been producing concrete batch plants right here in Blair, Nebraska since the beginning. Back in 1957, Robert Milek founded the Concrete Equipment Company on a small lot just a few miles from the Missouri River. 67 years later, CON-E-CO (ASTEC acquired the company in 2020) is still going strong, producing bigger and better concrete batch plants, and more than ever before. These days, the Blair facility produces up to 60 individual plants each year—and they can build one, from start to finish, in as little as 10 days.
Blair native Craig Olson, Senior Sales Manager at ASTEC CON-E-CO, has been with the company for 29 years. He isn’t surprised at the success they’ve had: “Our guys do a phenomenal job.” That’s for sure: according to Olson, their company has developed a reputation for always-solid work, even on custom projects: “Not every site is the same. We’re known as the company that designs to our customers’ needs.”
It’s that dual commitment—equipment that’s both tailor-built and “works like it’s supposed to,” as Olson puts it—that has seen ASTEC CON-E-CO grow their distribution network both domestically and globally. During the Great Recession in 2008, ASTEC CON-E-CO sold ten concrete batch mixers to Australia, where they were used to build roads. “We’re always improving,” Olson said. “Improving our processes, improving our distribution, everything.” Now, ASTEC CON-E-CO equipment can be found everywhere from Brazil to Papua New Guinea, and their footprint is only growing.
As for the future, Olson is confident that ASTEC CON-E-CO will continue to flourish. The partnership with ASTEC has been a welcome development for the workers here in Blair: “They take pride in their companies, and we take pride in our work.”
The Manufacturing Express departed the Blair facility today with a greater appreciation for the equipment manufacturers that support America’s concrete production—as much as the concrete that supports just about every construction project in the U.S. America is built on concrete, and the men and women at ASTEC CON-E-CO are proud to be the ones making it possible.
