Business Profile: International Wire Dies

Business Profile: International Wire Dies

Tucked away in quiet Gilman, CT is International Wire Dies. Its placid setting on the Yantic River belies its international nature. This small eastern CT manufacturer with a staff of seven does business throughout the U.S., Poland, Germany, Mexico, Israel, and China. 
 
True to its name, International Wire Dies (IWD) is an eastern CT manufacturer specializing in assembling wire dies. Its products are high-performance and precise.  Currently, the facility offers Industrial natural stones and polycrystalline diamond dies, as well as superior quality extrusion tips. All of its products are made to order for clients’ specific product. IWD also helps clients maintain inventory and keep their costs down by rehabilitating worn dies. 
 
Owner and Founder A. Simon Farjoun brings over twenty-five years of experience of industry expertise and process management to IWD. Before founding the company, he worked as a quality director and engineer for a wire manufacturer in Israel which had auxiliary factories in New Hampshire and Connecticut. Farjoun was transplanted to the U.S. to help the company reduce costs and reduce the amount of scrap metal left from their manufacturing process by placing QMS (Quality Management System) based on the ISO 9001-2008 standard. 
 
“Problems can be fixed only if you solve the route cause of the problems and place a creative preventive action” says Farjoun. “It’s important to improve little details.” 
 
These “little details” range from the most minute adjustments to one of his die presses to changing the operating practices of his company. After the company was sold in 2009, Farjourn set out on his own to start International Wire Dies. He promptly pushed his new company to earn ISO 9001-9008 certification. According to Farjourn, the certification is necessary to show the world that his company manufacturers a superior product with a consistency quality all the time.
 
“ISO means a quality standard that the company must follow,” Farjourn says. “Having ‘Manufactured in the USA’ means something is a higher brand. If we sacrifice our quality [in order to match prices from overseas competitors], we’ve made a mistake. We’d be losing our personality and our advantage. Our product is our advantage.”
 
According to Farjourn, IWD’s biggest challenge comes from overseas competitors who may be able to offer lower prices for custom dies, but cannot match the quality IWD guarantees.
 
“Competition from overseas is killing everybody. Every manufacturer is struggling. American clients want to pay Chinese prices, but if I charge Chinese prices for my products, I cannot hire American employees,” says Farjourn.
 
To an entrepreneur who defines success by being able to pay all his bills and hire good employees for a decent wage, price wars against foreign manufacturers are troubling to Farjourn. Nonetheless, he is optimistic business will improve for IWD.
 
“Everybody needs dies. We’re here making dies for every possible application and purpose,” Farjourn says. “At the end of the day in every business, being in the USA must mean a lot. It’s up to us to maintain our high standard of quality because that standard is what we are selling more than anything else. Our standard is why our clients choose to come to us, and it is not something we could afford to lose.”