Winsert acquires Mack Tool & Engineering in South Bend, Indiana

Rich Palzewic

Staff

December 1, 2025

MARINETTE – Following a series of acquisitions and newly secured contracts, Winsert Vice President and General Manager Jason Anderson said the company is targeting at least 50% growth over the next 18-24 months.

He said the recent acquisition of Mack Tool & Engineering in South Bend, Indiana, is a key step in supporting that continued growth.

“Mack is heavily involved in the aerospace and medical industry,” he said. “It was a focus of ours to get into those end markets. In Marinette, we are focused on highway, power generation and industrial applications, but those sectors are cyclical. The acquisition of Mack helps offset those downtimes.”

Anderson said once the acquisition was finalized, the company rebranded Mack Tool & Engineering as Winsert-South Bend.

“Operations remain in South Bend with about 22 employees,” he said. “That opens up our metal-forming and metal-shaping capabilities. For some of the intricate things we need, we don’t quite have the equipment for that type of work, but the South Bend location does. We are very excited about the acquisition and the capabilities it will bring to Winsert.”

Acquisitions = more diversity

Anderson said the Mack Tool & Engineering acquisition marks the latest move in the company’s ongoing expansion strategy, which has been a central focus since being acquired by Altus Capital Partners – a U.S.-based investment firm specializing in middle-market manufacturing companies – in March 2022.

Since then, he said the Winsert team has been actively looking for acquisitions “that make sense.”

“When we were acquired by Altus Capital, that allowed us to accelerate growth, as well as create added value and capabilities that will benefit both current and new customers,” he said. 

That started, Anderson said, with the acquisition of New Jersey-based Alloy Cast Products – an investment casting company – in October 2022.

Investment castings, he said, are created when a wax pattern is surrounded by a ceramic shell before the wax is melted out and then filled with molten metal.

“Once we acquired that company, its former customers and businesses came under the Marinette roof – [bringing] operations in-house to Marinette,” he said. “We offered all the employees in New Jersey the chance to relocate to Marinette if they so desired, and we actually had one employee take us up on that offer.”

Though Winsert has grown its capabilities through the recent Mack Tool & Engineering acquisition and the earlier purchase of Alloy Cast Products, Anderson said there is no immediate need to increase the company’s footprint in Marinette.

“These are strategies we’ve executed on,” he said. “Though we currently don’t need to add square footage, we will be growing from an employee standpoint. With these acquisitions and Winsert’s expected growth and secured contracts, I’d estimate we’ll need between 50-70 additional employees. We are currently working through those details.”

At this point, President Mark Coduti said it’s cost-prohibitive for Winsert to add square footage.

“Obviously, if you need to add square footage, that’s what you have to do, but construction costs are currently high,” he said. “To start, we’ll restructure things with our equipment and get into a weekend shift to help with the increased volume.”

Looking ahead, Coduti said the company remains open to pursuing additional acquisitions if the right opportunities arise.

“Altus Capital is always searching and looking for deal opportunities,” he said. “That could be add-on companies or to add to their platform – just like Winsert was an added platform for them.”

Though the Winsert team had more familiarity with the New Jersey investment casting business, Coduti said the Indiana acquisition had been on Altus Capital’s radar.

“Altus wants to help us get where we want to go as a company,” he said.

As Winsert continues to grow, Anderson said focusing on the company’s culture will be critical to meeting its recruiting goals.

“We are making a hard push to establish our culture,” he said. “We call it the ‘Three T’s of Winsert – Transparency, Trust and Teamwork.’ We’re striving to be an employer of choice in the area. It’s been a big push in the last year for us.”

Community give-back

Both Coduti and Anderson said that though employees are their top priority, supporting local youth is also very important to them.

Coduti said Winsert fosters a strong sense of community, which the team enjoys sharing with local youth.

“Jason and I are both from here, and most of our employees are from this area,” he said. “We want to be here, and so do our employees – it’s not just a job to us.”

Coduti said because of Winsert’s local roots and his and Anderson’s sports backgrounds, the company supports numerous area youth sports teams.

“Our give-back centers around youth and future development,” he said. 

With the number of manufacturing jobs in the area decreasing over the years, Coduti said Winsert aims to do its part to support the community.

“We want to do our part in that area,” he said. “We also do anything we can to push technology and the trades. We need maintenance workers and machinists.”

Just as Winsert invests in the community, Anderson said supporting and investing in the company itself is also a top priority.

“We take pride in our space here – not only in our employee base but in how clean the facility is,” he said. “As we said, we’ll have to hire quite a few more employees, but we will also be putting a significant investment into the equipment we’ll need for our increased work. We’ll have new CNC equipment, grinders, new molding machines, etc., coming into the foundry.”

Coduti said part of being able to handle an increased workload is being ready.

“It’s one thing to say we want more work and secure contracts, but we also have to be ready for that,” he said. “It’s not something where in 18 months we can start getting ready – we have to start thinking about that now. It takes time to order equipment, have it delivered, set it up and become proficient at using it.”

Ramping up for future work, Coduti said, requires investing now.

“Investing now is needed for the future,” he said. “We’d rather be ready for the volume as compared to saying, ‘The volume is here, now let’s scramble.’ What we do is all coming back to the business – it’s about the growth and betterment [of Winsert].”

For more information on Winsert, visit winsert.com.