Business View Magazine | February 2019

37 “Usually we do, but if not,we’ll perform the formula- tion work from scratch. Part of the reason for the in- vestment in our lab is to be able to perform almost all of the development and qualification testing required to validate a product to a new specifica- tion.This is especially important as many of our customers have reduced their engineering capacity to qualify these materials, due to cost pressures and headcount reduction. For many of our customers,we act as their out-of-house engineering department. We work directly with the engineers that are writ- ing the specs and determining the functional need. We’ve really evolved in that way, and can really provide value to OEMs and Service Organizations of all sizes.” Approximately a third of Astro Chemical’s business is international,with shipments going direct-to- sites around the world, typically to Europe,Asia, and South America.These specialtymaterials are sup- plied in a wide variety of sizes, from kits of a few ounces to 55-gallon drums.Most of Astro’s products are packaged in pre-weighed kits for ease of mixing and application by the user, in sizes that best fit the end-use application and reduce waste. Arnold notes,“We have 25 employees, so a small footprint. Because of our large product catalog, our manufacturing operations are set up to monitor inventory levels and react quickly.While we carry inventory on most of our products, they tend to be ordered last minute, so we need to be able to turn around production batches in a matter of hours. Many of our materials are shelf-life sensitive, 12 to 36 months. Considering the variety in product de- mand and the shelf life,we prefer to manage inven-