DE PERE, Wis. — For 14 years, Justin Fager has spent much of his workday behind a welder’s mask at Dürr Systems, Inc. in De Pere.
It’s a job where he said no two days are alike.
“Today, I was working on some combustion air piping and air seal piping for our Clean Switch line,” Fager said. “I was working on getting that all tacked together and welded together so our guys can fit it out, out here in the shop.”
Part of what he enjoys about the job is the problem-solving on the production floor.
“I love putting things together with my hands. I love that creative style,” he said. “Just having the free will that if it doesn’t fit, I’ve got to make it fit.”
Rodney Schwartz is the vice president of Clean Technologies Systems Americas, a Dürr division in De Pere.
He said the company offers a range of products for different markets. That includes building drying systems, air pollution control systems and machines for lithium-ion battery production.
Dürr is seeking people for production careers ranging from welding and mechanical assembly to electricians.
It’s also hiring electrical and mechanical engineers and designers, and process chemical engineers.
“If I had a can of soda in here, we’ve got air pollution control technologies that are handling the air emissions off of aluminum can production,” Schwartz said.
Then he reached across his desk and picked up a pad of sticky notes.
“These sticky notes over here, we have drying systems that dry this product in a non-contact flotation manner. We also have air pollution control devices that handle the emissions off those drying systems,” Schwartz said.
One of the fastest growing areas is the production of machines that make anodes and cathodes for lithium-ion battery production.
Schwartz said Dürr is looking for workers with varying levels of experience.
“We’re looking for experienced people, inexperienced people,” he said. “Both, really.”
Adam Shambeau regularly chats with the people working in the production area. He’s the director of engineering.
“We have a wide variety of customers and products we’re responsible to develop solutions for. We do it for the entire lifecycle of the product, from conception all the way to servicing, and keeping the unit working throughout its lifecycle,” Shambeau said. “Every day is a little different flavor or challenge, and it takes our team working together to find the solutions.”
Dürr, like many other businesses, is seeing more long-time workers retire. That’s opening opportunities for new people in the industry.
“We’ve had guys working here the past 30 or 40 years. It’s hard to replace that knowledge when they’re ready to retire, so we’re having a lot of new guys come in,” Fager said. “It’s exciting at the same point to see all those new faces.”
You can learn more about careers at Dürr Systems, here.