Yes, when Mike and I first started, production of our beach wheelchairs occurred in our living room, and on the back porch Marketing consisted of me and my mother at the kitchen table, stuffing envelopes with product information, and Mailing them!! This was PID (pre internet days) so business was done a little differently than today.
As our company grew, we knew we needed to expand our operations. Our solution was to build and equip a little “shop” in the backyard, We hired our first full time employee and felt comfortable our new production capabilities could easily keep up with sales. We couldn’t have been more wrong!
It didn’t take long before the shop activities began to invade our house. It was pretty innocuous at first, A finished beach wheelchair in my the living room, a bag of nuts, bolts, and washers on the kitchen counters, and various tools, or equipment lying around on the pool deck. However, as time passed, the invasion continued.
The garage was where the welding, milling, drilling took place. The pool deck became the surfox station. The side of the backyard shop was the grinding area, and inside the shop was were the tubing was cut and bent, Slings, and cushions were sewn in one bedroom, and ready to be assembled chairs were stored in the second bedroom. Eventually, the living room became the packaging and shipping department
Before I realized it, I had two full time employees, and at times an additional three to five part time employees, all stomping around the house, going from one work station to the next. The sounds that filled our house on a daily basis consisted of, tape being ripped across boxes, doors continuously being opened and shut, and an air compressor that never, ever, seemed to shut off,
I was usually in my office with the dogs and my cat, multi tasking all the administrative, and marketing duties, door tightly shut
It was insane. We had to move
Finally after much searching we found the perfect Shop for Debug Mobility Products In 2014 we moved on up to our new location!
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This is a view panning from the back of the shop towards the front. The first thing you see is the welding station. As you can tell there are many parts that are ready to be welded. and fabricated into beach wheelchair frames. From there the camera takes you to the front of the shop, then over to the far wall. On the far wall, you can see the milling machines, lathe and bender, In the middle is the cold saw and assembly table