BOONVILLE − A new Kawasaki Motors manufacturing facility has opened up in Boonville. The facility started mass production of equipment on Feb. 28 with about 80 employees.
Kawasaki now has two manufacturing plants in Missouri, with Boonville being the smaller of the two. The other location is in Maryville and has about 950 employees.
The plant has one assembly line in place right now. It expects to add a second in July and a couple more next fall. Even with only one assembly line, the plant turns out about 1,200 engines for lawnmowers and other items for the residential market per day.
Senior Manager Monte Hoskey believes the plant could have about 300 employees and become one of the biggest employers in Boonville.
“Right now we’re adding on six to 10 each week,” Hoskey said. “Our goal is to have about 300 hired on by October, November. And if hiring allows, we’ll continue to hire up to maybe 500 people total by the time we get our third assembly line in and possibly adding a fourth, as long as the staffing continues.”
Hoskey said Boonville lost five larger industries over the last three or four years, which made the company want to put a plant in the area.
“And so it really, we felt that the job pool in the Boonville area would be great for for our needs,” Hoskey said.
An assembly line worker from Boonville, Zack Sandbothe, gets to work at about 6 a.m. for his 10-hour shift. He said staying close to family is what attracted him the most to this opportunity.
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“Seeing a corporation like Kawasaki coming in and figure that’d be a great opportunity to do something better with myself and try to be and a company that treats you like family,” Sandbothe said.
Supervisor Jamie Robertson said the new plant is a unique experience, but he looks forward to the future.
“We’re all learning new jobs, and we’re in everybody’s growing and, I mean, we’re having our two steps forward, one step back thing. Everybody has frustration daily, but you know, we’re working through it,” Robertson said. “So I just, I gotta tell everybody, I wish we could fast forward three months, and then everything’s just like, rolling.”
He also reiterated the aspect of family that can be seen within the Boonville Kawasaki plant.
“You’re helping your neighbor and you haven’t learned or if you see something they’re doing wrong, and you try to help them or you try to point out something that might help them, you know, it’s the same thing, what we’re doing. We’re trying to get processes going through the plant are the best process that we can do,” Robertson said.
Robertson said he believes Kawasaki is going to be a “force here in the next five to 10 years.”
“You know, with the ability of the plant and how much they care about their employees and stuff,” Robertson said.
The plant was established in October 2021 as a division of Kawasaki Motors Manufacturing corporation.