Branching out

Thermoseal USA, with its headquarters in west central Ohio, provides fluid sealing products to a wide range of industries, among them the petrochemical and chemical industries, food, paper, mining, steel, and shipbuilding. The company recently celebrated the relocation of its branch in Houston, Texas, on September 14. Industry leaders and customers joined our American colleagues for a grand opening event.

Thermoseal first established a branch office and Innovation Center in Houston in 2014. The underlying motivation was to increase customer proximity and to better serve a large share of its regional customers: Houston is the epicenter of one of the largest concentrations of refineries and petro­chemical plants in the world. The city is also a world leader in the chemical industry, featuring nearly 40 percent of the nation’s capacity for producing the basic chemicals used by downstream chemical operations – the Houston-Baytown-Huntsville area is home to over 400 chemical plants. As a result of the untiring efforts of the on-site sales and manufacturing teams as well as the renowned quality of the KLINGER products on offer, the existing warehouse and manufacturing space slowly but surely grew too small over the years. “Our Houston branch was rapidly approaching its limits. So we decided to turn this challenge into an opportunity, meaning a way for us to increase the presence of the global KLINGER brand and to manufacture and provide more of our products here,” states Thermoseal’s President, Scott Peters. No sooner said than done, he got in touch with Deon van der Walt, Thermoseal Houston’s General Manager, and the search for a new property was on.

Fast forward to summer 2018 and to Thermoseal, the proud owner of a new building situated in the industrious south of Houston. Featuring an area of 21,000 square feet (approximately 1,950 sqm) it is roughly two times larger than the previous business location. Designed and erected by local contractors in accordance with Thermoseal’s specifications, customers will in future benefit from its enhanced gasket cutting capabilities, Maxiflex spiral wound gaskets, and from the addition of an on-site metal gasket manufacturing section. “Producing cut gaskets and spiral wound gaskets in Houston allows direct availability of KLINGER products and solutions to the local market as well as much of the United States," explains Deon.  

Housewarming party

The fact that Thermoseal’s new Houston branch is now open for business was celebrated together with existing customers as well as potential new end users on September 14 of this year. Scott Peters: “Our recent open house was a great opportunity to showcase our new facilities in Texas and to promote our new product offerings, for example the metal gaskets we can now manufacture here.” And Deon van der Walt adds: “The new branch reflects the principles of our mission statement. Focusing on quality, a commitment to growth as well as customer proximity, it couples local sales and technical support with a strong manufacturing presence.” According to guests and colleagues, the aforementioned open house was a great success. Even the predictable Texas weather, in the form of rain and very high temperatures, could not dampen the feeling that Thermoseal had begun a new chapter in its company history. A Texas-style barbeque and refreshments as well as the opportunity to tour the new facility led to many interesting discussions between the local staff and its customers. Looking back on what has been achieved, Deon van der Walt summarizes: “Relocating to a new branch location is a time-consuming task and never easy. We nevertheless managed to do so whilst simultaneously maintaining the daily business at peak efficiency rates, and for this I am especially grateful to our employees. I am very much looking forward to showing our clients what our new and enhanced branch can now offer.”