Case Knife Factory in Bradford, Pennsylvania Set for Expansion

When a company that prides itself on expert craftsmanship, and generations of history and experience decides to hire close to one hundred people, it takes some intensive training strategies to bring the new hires up to speed.

That's just what W.R. Case and Sons Cutlery had to do after a 2007 expansion that brought 98 new people on staff. Administrators launched "Case University" so that the new hires could be taught the skills needed to make knives, and so that the workers could learn what Fred Feightner calls, "Case Pride."

The Case University training program will continue at full steam this year, as an estimated 80-90 people could get hired on in 2008 as well.

Consumer Marketing Coordinator Fred Feightner said, "Bringing in 90 people presents a lot of challenges, because, first of all, we didn't have room for them to work." Case spent a lot of time restructuring their workstations and work flow to make room for more employees to be able to make knives.

With a similar increase predicted this year, more room may be necessary. Feightner said that he couldn't comment on a rumored physical plant expansion, but indicated that more information may be forthcoming.

The biggest challenge in bringing in new people is more intrinsic, according to Feighter. "Taking 90 people and giving them a sense of what Case is all about is a huge challenge. The reason it's a steady and good place of employment is because we have generations of people from the same families that have worked out here. It's been going on since Case started. We want to instill a sense of 'Case Pride' in our workers. It's what's behind the brand."

Part of instilling Case Pride involves taking pride in the workers themselves. "The consumers identify with a working person who gets up every day and punches a clock and does their job and does it well and does it with owndership and pride and the company's interests in mind."

That concept has been injected into all of Case's marketing, featuring photos and quotes of the workers in many of their catalogs and promotional information.