Welding’s Arc Toward Change
By Roline Pascal, Alexandra QuiÑones, and Cindy Weihl
Companies share their perspectives on industry challenges and opportunities
The welding industry has had its share of challenges in the last two years. Some were new, such as the COVID-19 pandemic and the resulting supply chain issues. And some had been brewing for a while, like the need for skilled labor. But where there are challenges, there are also opportunities. We asked several companies in the welding industry to share their thoughts on the state of the industry and how they’ve exercised resiliency in these unique times.
What is the state of your company/industry today?
Worley, Airgas: Airgas is in a key transformative period. Since 2000, we’ve transformed into a national operating company focused on growing organically with customers and providing a full range of gas supply modes and product offerings. Today, and since becoming part of Air Liquide nearly six years ago, we’ve been evolving through the pandemic and related global supply chain challenges to position our customers to fill their potential globally by supplying them with products, expertise, and technology.
Taylor, Hypertherm: We continue to see strong demand for our products, but strong sales are tempered with ongoing supply chain shortages and delays. We’re working with our supply chain partners to do everything we can to return lead times to prepandemic schedules. We have seen substantial progress in this area.
Skilled labor is another critical issue. Hypertherm has the advantage of being employee owned and having a no-layoff policy, so we held onto all our associates through the pandemic. This helped us ramp up quickly when business returned. However, even with this in place, finding capable associates at all skill levels remains challenging. We continue to invest in training programs and educational partnerships to help fill these gaps.
Melvin, Kapco: The industry remains strong, and we’ve experienced record sales growth over the last calendar year. This includes organic growth amongst our existing customers and business from new partners looking to move fast and respond quickly to changing market conditions with a domestic manufacturer. That growth has given us the opportunity to reinvest in state-of-the-art equipment and facilities upgrades.
Mapes, Lincoln: The industry is in a very favorable position and Lincoln Electric is better positioned today than it has ever been in the past. After years of mini-industrial recessions and deferred capital investment, all of our end markets have pivoted to growth and are investing in their operations . . . We see investments in infrastructure repair, electric vehicle platforms, and renewables to all be favorable to the industry as well as reshoring manufacturing to shorten supply chains and expanding capacity through automation and additive solutions.
Campbell, Universal Robots: Universal Robots has seen enormous growth over recent years. In 2021, for example, our company increased sales by 41% over 2020, driven by the labor gap and the need for automation that is easy to deploy and flexible. We expect to see growth of greater than 35% in 2022. So, the industry is strong and our robot business is particularly strong.
What are the biggest challenges facing the welding/manufacturing industry today? And do you see those challenges changing within the next five years?
Worley, Airgas: The welding and manufacturing industry needs to keep adapting its workforce and propelling the industry forward with talented and engaged employees. It’s important to create an inclusive environment that encourages contributions and fresh ideas. Teams with diverse thinking and life experiences — regardless of gender, race, or age — can bring value, so it’s more important than ever to ensure all employees have a comfortable working environment to thrive in.
To sustain the welding workforce, it’s also important for companies like Airgas to contribute our resources to help advance students’ careers in welding. For example, our High School Welding Education Initiative leverages the company’s national footprint, robust skilled welding specialist team, and access to welding hardgoods, gases, and consumables to assist underserved high school technology programs.
Over the next five years, we see innovation in welding opening new avenues, markets, and uses. With automation, cobots, and additive manufacturing, technology is rapidly evolving. At the same time, older technologies can be upgraded and retrofitted to help businesses stay competitive.
Taylor, Hypertherm: I see two main challenges right now. One is ongoing disruption to the supply chain and the other is the need for skilled labor. We certainly expect the supply chain crisis to improve with time, but the need for skilled labor will not fix itself. It will take dedicated efforts and resources from across the industry. We need increased focus on vocational programs, educator training, apprenticeship programs, scholarships, and attracting more women to the welding profession.
Melvin, Kapco: Our biggest challenges are hiring experienced welders and training and retaining inexperienced new hires.
There aren’t enough young people starting careers in the trades to fill manufacturing positions. Some of this is likely due to a misunderstanding of the trades, but even more so, priorities in education. Fortunately, it seems this mindset may be starting to shift as more STEM classes are being offered in high schools and even middle schools. This helps open eyes to the many careers available in manufacturing, including among women. While men have historically dominated skilled trades, the number of women in the industry is increasing. As an example, women make up about 4% of the welding industry (Ref. 1). At Kapco, women make up 25% of our welding team.
Lastly, when you look at how many young adults, especially during the pandemic, have struggled to find jobs, I believe more people may discover that the manufacturing industries pay trade workers quite well.
Mapes, Lincoln: Labor and supply chain constraints remain near-term challenges. There’s still a need for welders in the United States, and the industry is addressing that need in two ways. The first is the investment in advanced education programs, which we, the American Welding Society, the National Association of Manufacturers, and community colleges and career tech centers are driving . . . The second solution is focused on expanding welding capacity through the use of automation and other processes that reduce the need for manual welding for repetitive tasks.
Skilled labor isn’t the only challenge. Supply chain shortages and bottlenecks are impacting businesses regardless of end sector. Whether it’s chips, electronic components, commodities, freight, etc., we are all managing through a challenging operating environment. We are still expecting to grow in 2022 despite these headwinds and will continue to navigate and mitigate the supply chain dynamics. We are hoping to see some improvement in the second half of the year and, in the interim, are continuing to monitor the dynamic conditions that can impact supply chains.
Campbell, Universal Robots: The welding industry’s biggest problem is the need for skilled labor. This is not a new phenomenon, but it was exacerbated by the pandemic and macroeconomic factors. There is a current annual shortfall of 84,700 welders in the United States alone, according to data from the American Welding Society (weldingworkforcedata.com). Another issue is the relatively high rate of illness-related absenteeism among welders compared to other jobs.
With the average age of skilled welders on the rise and few younger workers taking up the skill, it’s difficult to see the situation improving in the coming years.
Another issue, particularly among small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), is a lack of experience with welding automation. Their perception of automation has been influenced by traditional industrial robots that are complex and time-consuming to deploy, have a large footprint, and require extensive safety guarding. However, collaborative robot systems are increasingly proven in industrial welding applications and have been shown to provide SMEs with a cost-effective, easy-to-deploy alternative to traditional welding automation. We expect collaborative robots to grow in popularity over the coming years, particularly among SMEs.
How was your business affected by COVID-19? How are you moving forward as we return to normal?
Worley, Airgas: Navigating the ambiguity of the pandemic business climate has enhanced our adaptability and the ways we can support customers. For example, our 900-plus branch locations, an eBusiness platform, and the Airgas Total Access® telesales channel.
We are continuing to evolve in a way that optimizes our customers’ competitiveness through data and digital technology and are well positioned to make the best of both the person-to-person B2B environment and the dynamic, everchanging digital B2B world.
We are focused on delivering the right products and data-driven services to help our customers environmentally optimize their processes while reducing our own carbon footprint; ensuring a reliable, efficient, local supply of essential molecules to all customers; engaging a diverse and inclusive workforce; acting safely with business integrity; and making a meaningful difference by creating a sustainable future.
Taylor, Hypertherm: For our manufacturing facilities, we reconfigured our manufacturing floor to maintain social distancing and keep our plants running at full capacity. We even sent Hypertherm associates to work for our local suppliers when they were having staffing issues. This helped keep our suppliers at full capacity so we had the parts needed to make our products.
We halted travel for our sales team for two years. This travel restriction drove us to better utilize technology, like Microsoft Teams and Zoom, to maintain our relationships with our sales partners. We leveraged these digital platforms to do most of our product and sales training, and it was so effective that we’ll continue to use these tools now that the sales team is back on the road and free to travel.
Melvin, Kapco: There were challenges that we certainly had to accept and adapt to. For example, managing the day-to-day efforts of keeping an entire manufacturing operation sanitized, deep cleaned, and free of outside contaminants. In hindsight, it helped us by now having protocols in place to quickly respond to those kinds of situations. Another challenge was balancing team dynamics with team members out due to COVID. Thanks to our training department and the talents of our employees, we’re blessed with a very versatile, cross-trained team.
We also had to manage fluctuating sales demand. After an initial slowing at the onset of the pandemic due to fear and uncertainty in the market, demand quickly flipped and we had one of our best periods in Kapco’s 50-year history.
Today, we’re moving forward by getting back to normal through face-to-face meetings, interactions of team meetings, and daily conferences but also by managing the possibility of spikes of the virus returning to the region.
Mapes, Lincoln: COVID-19 tested Lincoln Electric, and I’m proud of how our entire organization showed tremendous commitment to our customers and perseverance in working through the many challenges faced during 2020 and 2021. We did many things right. We led with a people-first philosophy, prioritizing the safety of our workers and putting our customers’ needs at the forefront of our decision making. We also used our balance sheet to elevate inventories to support the recovery and amplified the flexibility of our operations to substitute whenever possible to circumvent supply chain bottlenecks. We believe these actions positioned us for continued growth in 2022 and beyond.
Operationally, we are continuing to digitize and automate processes where possible to drive efficiencies and continue to integrate some of the best practices we developed during COVID to maintain high productivity levels. We continue to focus on recruitment and retention in this tight labor market and have expanded our recruiting program and to ensure we have the best available talent to execute on our strategy.
Campbell, Universal Robots: Like many companies, Universal Robots has had to deal with supply chain issues and social distancing regulations implemented as part of the global pandemic response. Close ties with our suppliers and sophisticated forecasting are helping us to navigate the supply chain crisis. Those decisions proved crucial to maintaining supply throughout the COVID-19 situation and the following global shortage of semiconductors.
The pandemic exacerbated several trends that were already driving cobot adoption — the labor gap, the drive for increased productivity, the rise of Industry 4.0 — so, as industry returns to normal, we are seeing increased interest in collaborative automation. As that interest scales up, we plan to scale up production.
Conclusion
As companies adopt more automation and find creative ways to recruit labor, it’s clear that the welding industry will endure through ingenuity, necessity, and grit.
Reference
1. U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. Labor Force Statistics from the Current Population Survey. bls.gov/cps/cpsaat11.htm
ROLINE PASCAL (rpascal@aws.org) is education editor, ALEXANDRA QUIÑONES (aquinones@aws.org) is associate editor, and CINDY WEIHL (cweihl@aws.org) is senior editor, Welding Journal.
Fig 1 Photo courtesy of Kapco Metal Stamping
