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Rubber molding is dominated both in the US and internationally by some very large, vertically-oriented producers. In the automotive sector, for example, companies such as Tenneco produce vast quantities of rubber parts for automotive OEMs which are used as individual components and as parts in manufactured assemblies. Such suppliers are not likely to be in a position to accept orders for custom molded rubber parts due to the sheer volume of business they receive from their regular customers. Still, molded rubber parts are critical in many commercial products ranging from appliances to medical devices.

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With that in mind, this article steps back a bit from listing the gargantuan companies for whom rubber molding is but a part of their larger operations and instead looks at US companies that do rubber molding as their main, or major, endeavor. For anyone looking to source rubber molded products in the US, it is highly likely that any of the companies listed here would be happy to receive a call.

Top US Rubber Molders

Table 1 below ranks the US molders of custom rubber products listed in descending order by estimated revenue.

Table 1 Top US Molders of Custom Rubber Goods¹

Company Summaries

Fairchild Industries manufactures a comprehensive line of industrial and automotive door seals, weatherstripping, and the like. It also offers custom rubber molding services to automotive, agricultural, and industrial OEMs, as well as Tier 1 and aftermarket suppliers. The company provides a full plate of engineering and design services to accompany its custom moldings.

Flexan molds silicone rubber and plastic medical components with facilities in both the US and China. Molding is performed in cleanrooms to conform to the requirements of medical device manufacturing. The company began in 1946 by producing a rubber mold over a metal plate which Sears used in the development of a flexible sander.

Garlock, widely known for its gaskets, packings, and seals, also maintains a custom rubber molding operation with a gang of presses available to produce injection, compression, and transfer molded parts. The company works with the full range of available elastomeric materials and offers compounding and custom mixing, as well.

JDS Technologies, based in Oneida, TN, molds custom rubber products for the oil and gas, aerospace, automotive, appliance, and medical industries. Products include gaskets, seals and O-rings, hoses, duckbill valves, pipette bulbs, etc. A second facility in Louisiana specifically manufactures oilfield products.

MoldTech offers its customers in the aerospace, automotive, consumer goods, medical, and similar industries a full range of services from engineering to compounding in the production of molded rubber goods. The company’s manufacturing capabilities include compression, transfer, and injection molding at its facility in Lancaster, NY.

Robin Industries caters to the medical device and automotive industries, providing compression, transfer, and injection molding of custom elastomer products. The company maintains operations in the US, China, and Mexico, and provides a host of value-added services from design engineering to material formulation.

Robinson Rubber manufactures custom molded rubber items for a variety of industries with products ranging from spark plug boots to pump impellers. The company sources manufacturing to factories through its global initiatives program, while maintaining engineering expertise in house. The company publishes several documents on rubber molding.

Ames Rubber, of Hamburg, NJ, provides rubber molding and coating services to a variety of customers in industries from aerospace to medical device manufacturing. The company specializes in developing industrial elastomers for a variety of applications. Its AMESShield, for instance, is a spray-on elastomeric coating designed to protect aero-engine components from corrosion.

Clark Rubber & Plastic provides natural and synthetic rubber molding services to industries ranging from solar energy to heavy-duty trucking. The company also provides a range of plastics forming services, which it conducts in a facility separate from the rubber molding operations.

Custom Rubber molds rubber into a variety of parts such as pads, bellows, grommets, hand grips, etc. for industrial machinery, material handling, and similar applications. The company also sells a variety of stock molded products such as pads and dock bumpers.

Da/Pro Rubber produces OEM rubber components using compression, transfer, injection, and micro-molding techniques. Customers range from aerospace to medical device manufacturers. The company operates five manufacturing facilities, with three in the US and two in China.

Goodyear Rubber, based in southern California, produces custom molded parts from natural and various synthetic rubbers. The company provides services to the aerospace and defense, mining, automotive, food processing, and similar industries. All manufacturing is done in the US.

Modus Advanced is a manufacturer of EMI shielding and die-cut gaskets that also produces custom silicone and natural molded rubber products in the US and in China. The company’s website offers detailed advice not only on the engineering aspects of custom molded parts but also considers the sourcing of products domestically versus overseas.

Rubber Associates specializes in custom rubber molding using compression, transfer, and injection molding techniques. The company works with EPDM, natural, nitrile, and other rubber materials, operating out of a 75,000 sq. ft. facility in Barberton, OH.

Stern Companies specializes in rubber and plastic molding through overseas manufacturing. In addition to rubber injection, transfer, and compression molding, the company provides plastics rotomolding, thermoforming, and similar services to OEM clients, with headquarters in Baxter, MN.

Universal Polymer & Rubber manufactures molded natural and synthetic rubber parts at a 150,000 sq. ft. facility in Middlefield, OH. The company has the expertise to guide customers in the best molding method for their rubber parts and will complete any secondary manufacturing operations such as deflashing on site. Products include EPDM rubber tarp straps and drainage pipe gaskets.

VIP Rubber and Plastic conducts all of its rubber compression, transfer, and injection molding operations at its La Habra, CA facility. The company’s website provides detailed information on the benefits and disadvantages of each molding process, a useful primer for clients wishing to source rubber molded parts.

Cooper Products manufactures custom radial shaft seals for use with bearings. The company manufactures all of its products in its Laconia, NH facility and provides custom molding of rubber products in low- and medium-volume runs in addition to its seal manufacturing operation.

Industrial Molded Rubber Products provides custom rubber injection, transfer, and compression molding services to a variety of industries from packaging machinery to oilfield products. The company also provides rubber-to-metal bonding and roller re-covering services.

Performance Polymer Technologies produces custom molded silicone and organic rubber parts for the aerospace and defense, medical, semiconductor, and instrumentation sectors. The company provides a suite of services as well, including materials selection, tooling design, and manufacturing process development.

RD Rubber Technology specializes is liquid silicone rubber injection molding, a two-component process that produces fast cure rates. The company can produce custom rubber molded goods in a cleanroom environment, as befitting the manufacture of non-implantable medical devices such as blood pumps and I.V. systems.

Santa Fe Rubber produces custom rubber parts using compression, transfer, and injection molding processes. The company serves the rubber molding needs of military and defense, automotive, oil and gas, instrumentation, and similar industries.

Summary

This article summarized the top US-based rubber molders capable of producing custom products. For more information on related products, consult our other guides or visit the Thomas Supplier Discovery Platform to locate potential sources of supply or view details on specific products.

Sources:

1. Recent Research on Global Rubber Molding Market Report 2020 – Industry Press Releases – APAC, Japan, US, UK & Europe
2. Rubber Molding for the Automotive Market 2021

FORT WAYNE, Ind.—Linda Muroski, president of Trelleborg Sealing Solutions Marketing Americas and the Global Healthcare and Medical segment, has been named one of Industry Era’s 10 Most Inspiring Women Leaders of 2021.

“Linda’s attitude and approach to her work at Trelleborg is reflective of our company strategy for growth,” said Peter Hahn, business area president of Trelleborg Sealing Solutions. “She understands that collaboration across business units is key and that it’s necessary to trust each other to do our best work. I’ve seen Linda ‘walk the talk’ and lead real change, which is why our team has been so successful under her leadership.”

A leader in diversity, Muroski initially made her mark by helping Trelleborg Sealing Solutions achieve its strategic goals one year early, all while pushing collaboration and employee empowerment for the greater good of the company.

Muroski also began the Together 2025 program, which focuses on talent, innovation, market and excellence.

“Linda encourages me to share and develop my ideas into capabilities Trelleborg will rely on for years to come,” said Heather Castleman, senior director of strategy and marketing. “She is a strong supporter of professional development and challenges me to expand my skill set and leadership capabilities. She is a purposeful mentor, and I will be forever grateful for all of the opportunities she’s presented to me during our time working together.”

As a leader of the Healthcare and Medical unit, Trelleborg said Muroski showed her “entrepreneurial spirit” in assembling a leadership team that assisted in business acquisition, ultimately enabling product offerings that assisted patient lives.

Trelleborg Sealing Solutions produces polymer seals and damping equipment for use in harsh environments.

ST. LOUIS—Communication is vital to a winning culture, and Reed Rubber Products Inc. has thrived for 96 years thanks largely to its ability to embrace new ideas, many of which come from its employees.

Its workers must agree, because they gave the St. Louis-based rubber product manufacturer the top score in Rubber & Plastics News’ inaugural Best Places to Work survey, conducted by Best Companies Group.

Reed is one of eight rubber industry companies that scored high enough to be labeled a rubber industry Best Place to Work.

“I spent my entire life in large corporate work settings and now I’ve come to work in a business of around 36 employees,” said Bob Barciszewski, the firm’s operations manager, who joined Reed in January. “I know everybody, everybody knows me. They really do see where each person’s individual input impacts the direction of the company. They’re very cognizant of the fact that they’re here to do a job, and it’s clearly seen if they’re doing it well or they’re not. They’re striving to do it very well, very few people need encouragement to do their job.”

The custom rubber shop makes a variety of extruded rubber products—Barciszewski said no two weeks are the same—using primarily thermoplastic vulcanizates to serve the HVAC, transportation/automotive aftermarket and window glazing industries, among others. The firm operates five extrusion lines on two 10-hour shifts with 36 employees at its 48,000-sq.-ft. facility in St. Louis.

Reed Rubber President Clark Reed, the third-generation owner of the firm, said another key to the firm’s strong culture is making sure the work force understands where the parts they are making ultimately wind up by showing the impact their work has on their customer’s success.

“Sure, money is important, but it’s true that they want to be doing something that they get,” he said. “Operating a machine in isolation is not something anyone just gets. We employ a few techniques to help them realize that they’re not just making a rubber gasket, they’re helping to build a car or a picnic cooler. What I always like to try to emphasize is that our mission is to help our customers succeed because I think that’s a lot more compelling than you guys are working to make us succeed.”

Teams work

Reed said the main ways the company shares information is through its monthly meetings, weekly and daily huddles, and its four focused teams. The goal behind its teams was to get everyone involved in different macro aspects of the business focused on safety, housekeeping, continuous improvement and scrap reduction. The teams meet monthly while team leaders continue to make sure decisions made are executed in between.

Once each team completes the three stages of developing new ideas—brainstorming, normalizing and performing—the company shuffles the deck. Barciszewski said this happened for the first time a few months ago, keeping the leaders the same while re-aligning the other members to get fresh ideas on each topic.

“It really gets each of the employees involved in something,” Barciszewski said.

The scrap team is the oldest of the four, but Reed said it previously only consisted of the company’s process engineers and other professional staff, not the line operators themselves. The team met more regularly—usually twice a month—reviewing scrap reports and, according to Reed, during the course of six months managed to reduce the firm’s scrap by 50 percent.

However, while the result was successful, Reed said they quickly discovered that the process was broken. The team would develop a solution and then disseminate the information through new work instructions, which ultimately left the people doing the work—the operators—out of the process.

“The operators who were needed to make these things happen would basically be told what to do without really having been directly consulted,” Reed said. “We recognized that it was important that, in order to get buy in, they needed to be part of finding the solution. Often they had more direct knowledge about these processes than we did.”

The new structure, and the addition of the three other teams, has led to some strong results during the first cycle, according to Barciszewski.

“As in any other type thing where you have lots of people involved, we’re probably at about 90 percent buy in,” Barciszewski said. “The vast majority realize they can really make a difference here and become that much more involved.”

Career support

Like many companies in the rubber industry, Reed Rubber is looking to attract and develop young talent. The team had an opening for a tooling engineer when they promoted their previous one to production manager. Instead of looking outside the company, they decided to try to develop from within.

Kyle Haase, one of the firm’s youngest employees, was given a shot at the tooling engineer’s job. Reed said he had a background in graphic art that might translate well to the new position. After a few months, the company and Haase realized it wasn’t a good fit. Barciszewski said when they reached that point, there was an explanation of what skills he didn’t have and where he needed to improve.

He added that Haase asked if he could still do some of the things he learned in his new role even though he was going back to the line, and the management team encouraged him to do so. Barciszewski said Haase enjoyed working with hand tools and running the mill, to name a few. The company paid for him to travel to Chicago for a three-day 3D AutoCAD course.

“Even though he’s not a tooling process engineer, he’s a higher skilled operator now and one of the few who have the ability and training and skills to do some machine shop work,” Barciszewski said.

Reed said while Haase didn’t work out as a tooling engineer, his pay went up as a result of the additional skills he learned and is now a more versatile employee. The door is open for Haase to fill in some of the skills he needs, namely the advanced math required of a tooling engineer. Barciszewski said if Haase decides he wants to fill in those gaps, the firm would invest in him.

“We want to keep trying because nobody wants a dead-end job,” Reed said.

Absorb information

Barciszewski said there is one constant when he, or other managers, are out on the floor engaging with employees.

“Listen before you speak, that goes further than anything,” Barciszewski said.

“When we’re out on the floor, we’re not giving directions—though we do have to at times—but we go out and ask the questions.”

One time, Barciszewski said he went up to an area and noticed it was cluttered, asking what could be done to fix it. An employee jumped at the task and designed a workstation that would be easier to keep organized. Barciszewski said the company developed it for him and it was so successful that it modeled it throughout the other extrusion lines.

Operators are encouraged to write down comments and monitor scrap, then communicate those to the right department using a color-coded system.

“It’s an attempt to collaborate and make sure everybody participates,” Reed said. “You know you have a task you have to get done and we’re not going to proceed until we get your input.”

The firm also places a major emphasis on safety, starting each meeting with a safety-related topic and encouraging employees to stop and inspect their workstations before they begin their shift.

“You’re only going to see it if you look for it,” Barciszewski said. “We want to make sure that before they go to get their materials that they look around their work area for anything that could be a hazard. It’s a repetitious thing every day. We’re driving in that mentality that you need to be looking for these things. I want our employees going home in just as good or better shape than when they came here.”

Reed also goes the extra mile to limit obstacles for employees. He said the last two years health insurance costs have increased by about 7 percent each year, but the company did not pass it on to the work force.

He also had an epiphany back in the early part of the decade when gas prices reached high levels. An employee, who lived in Illinois, came to collect his paycheck and casually mentioned that it cost him $30 to fill up his gas tank. Reed then developed a fuel assistance program where the company would calculate the commute for each employee in miles, then normalized gas prices on a weekly basis and credited employees back to help with their commutes.

“I’d love for the company to make money, but I really want for any person who spends time working here to be better off at the end of their time than when they first started. It’s tough enough for people to pay the bills,” Reed said.

“If you give someone a pleasant work environment, they will enjoy coming to work more.”