Setting standards

Bruce Warren still gets goosebumps when he walks through a once-shuttered Holland Township plant and sees it full of employees.

“This place was completely empty, lights out for seven years,” said Warren, general manager of Magna Closures Engineered Glass facilities on John F. Donnelly Drive. Magna looked at selling the building, he added. “To really survive, we had to shut a factory. When you close a factory, you never expect to open it again.”

He credits a three-year focus on improved innovation for the plant’s reopening. That innovation, resulting in the Magna PureView Seamless Slider, the new rear window of the Ford F-150, won the company Automotive News’ PACE Award. Automotive News describes the award as recognized around the world as the benchmark for innovation. It stands for Premier Automotive Suppliers' Contribution to Excellence, and the winners were announced at the 21st annual awards ceremony on April 20 in Detroit.

Seamless Slider is the result of Ford holding a design contest for the window, which Magna won.

“We had to differentiate ourselves,” Warren said, explaining that in manufacturing, there is always innovation, but Magna Engineered Glass had to step back and make innovation its focus after 10 years of declining sales. Once we turned it around, we’ve had growth every single year.”

The award-winning window is different than most truck rear windows because it is one piece of long glass rather than two pieces of glass mounted on plastic. PureView eliminates the seams of the older style of rear windows. It is a continuous piece of glass, which allows for defrost capabilities.

The center window is added on in hidden sliding window seams and it opens with the touch of a button. The window was designed, engineered and now produced at the Holland Township facility.

The glass producer supplies almost all of the world’s automakers, save Hyundai and Kia. It also makes glass products for some appliances companies, including Whirlpool. It makes rear truck windows for the Ford F-250, the Dodge Ram and Toyota’s Tundra and Tacoma trucks.

“Sales are as high as they’ve ever been,” Warren said.

For the Ford F-150, the company is making rear windows around the clock. In one week, it produced 10,000 windows, though the average is 7,000 or more.

For Ford, Magna is also making a triple-paned window for the 50th anniversary edition of the Ford Mustang. There will be 1,964 models produced, a nod to the year the car was introduced.

The plant on John F. Donnelly Drive in Holland Township has been around for 30 years, Warren said. Magna — headquartered in Aurora, Ontario — bought the division from Donnelly 12 years ago. The larger of the two buildings is 200,000 square feet, the smaller plant and the one shuttered for seven years is 100,000 square feet. The company added four production cells to the warehouse because it ran out of room on the production floor, Warren said.

“We’re installing and testing new equipment now,” said Stacey Burroughs, business development manager for Magna Engineered Glass. Burroughs also said Warren’s passion for the plant, the products and Holland is contagious, he’s also a Lakeshore Advantage board member.

“The best part is bringing all the jobs back,” Warren said. “Since 2009, we’ve doubled employees. … We didn’t hire anyone for almost 10 years.”

And now, “recruiting is our top priority,” Burroughs said. 

— Follow this reporter onFacebook or Twitter,@SentinelNetty and@bizholland.

Magna West Michigan

662 employees at Engineered Glass Division

659 employees at the two 128th Street, Holland Township, facilities

300 employees at Magna Mirrors on 40th Street in Holland

3,279 total Magna employees total in West Michigan including Newaygo, Lowell and Grand Haven facilities

28 manufacturing operations in Michigan

10,000 employees, roughly, in the state of Michigan

Magna is hiring at its Holland Township facilities

New innovation, growth and a win from Ford Motor Co. on a new design for the F-150's rear window has allowed Magna Engineered Glass to reopen a once-closed plant in Holland Township — and there are 75 jobs available there. 

The positions are full-time; 50 are weekend production jobs starting at $15 per hour. These employees need only a high school education, General Manager Bruce Warren said. They will be trained by Magna. 

The other 25 are engineering — mechanical, product development, plastics and quality — or skilled trades positions. The latter positions come with signing bonuses as well — $3,000 for engineers and $500 for skilled trades. 

Interested candidates should email egcareers@magna.com. 

By the numbers...