14-03-2025
Hennig Manufacturing Company continues to grow in Machesney Park, hires 200 workers
MACHESNEY PARK, Ill. (WTVO) — Leaders of a manufacturing company in Machesney Park said their business continues to grow with each passing year.
That's the word from Hennig chairman and CEO Dietmar Goellner. He gave Eyewitness News a tour of their facility on North Second Street. He said he's been in his role for roughly a quarter century.
'I love it because I love working with our people,' Goellner said. 'I love the fact that we've been able to do something that's extremely difficult. We've scaled our business every year for the last six, seven years. We've doubled our business year after year after year, and that's something we're proud of.'
While giving us a tour, he had to stop at times to marvel at the work his employees do.
'I come more from a machine tool background and so I just feel like every day I'm learning something new,' he said.
The facility manufactures large generator enclosures. They provide critical emergency backup power in case there's a primary power failure at places like massive data centers for companies like Amazon and Meta.
'We need to turn that that power on very quickly and it has to have a very high reliability that indeed it will come on when it needs to come on,' he said.
Goellner said it takes a lot of talented workers to make sure things run smoothly.
'Right now Hennig has probably north of 900 working here,' he said. 'We need to hire another 200 or so by the end of this year to meet our customer demand.'
They are hiring, he said. He said it's necessary to achieve the company's goals for growth.
'Our goal right now is to do 650 units this year,' he said. 'We want to do 800 to 900 units next year. And for the orders that we're receiving in 2027, our goal is to do 1200 units.'
Goellner said Hennig is always looking to improve how they run the business.
'There's a saying that your current state should be your worst state which means that we are striving for excellence and that every day, every week, every month we want to be better at what we do,' he said.
He said the sky is the limit for how far Hennig can grow in the years to come.
'So we are a family owned business. We're private. We're not owned by private equity. We're not publicly traded company,' he said. 'So as far as the future goes, everyone said that, 'hey, let's keep growing the business,' so this will get turned over to that third generation and we're excited about the future.'
Hennig's generator enclosures are up for being voted as the Coolest Thing Made in the State for this year's Makers Madness contest.
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