122. How Borg Design Built a 50-Machine Defense Manufacturing Powerhouse

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Most shop owners who hit 50 employees, steady profit, and a fourth generation coming up behind them would be tempted to coast. Andrew Borg decided to double down instead. Not because he has to, he’s quick to say the shop is profitable right where it is, but because he wants to build something that outlasts him.

A big part of that answer is automation. Borg Design runs a fleet of cobots that load parts and pallets around the clock, and Andrew’s goal is to double sales while only growing headcount by about half. We get into how they keep machines running 80 to 95 percent of the time over a seven day week, why the hard part isn’t building the system but figuring out what it does when a tool breaks at midnight, and how six full-time mechanical engineers fit inside a machine shop.

We also dig into CMMC. Borg Design earned its Level 2 certification this year, and Andrew is refreshingly honest about the cost, the false starts with vendors, and the one employee who basically read the entire standard and wrote their package. He shares why the inbound calls from primes only started showing up after they were certified, and the sub-tier problem that still keeps him up at night.

Then there’s the people question—which might be the most useful part of the whole conversation. Andrew has stopped trying to hire high-end machinists, because in his words they don’t exist on the open market. Instead he hires for work ethic and values and builds machinists over years. If you’re wrestling with the same thing, you’ll want to hear how he thinks about the path from operator to programmer.

This is the kind of conversation that’s the whole reason I do this show. A smart, transparent owner sharing exactly how he built something real, and where he’s still figuring it out. Grab a notepad. You’ll fill a page.

What’s Covered in this Episode

• (0:00) Meet Borg Design: 50 people, 50 machines, fourth generation, CMMC Level 2
• (4:35) Why a machine shop keeps six full-time mechanical engineers on staff
• (6:25) The origin story: a 1945 garage shop passed down three generations
• (8:14) Outgrowing four buildings on the way to 58,000 square feet
• (10:45) Working with primes, and the danger of being loved to death
• (12:35) What CMMC Level 2 really cost: five years, false starts, bad vendors
• (15:18) The consultant and the one employee who wrote the whole package
• (20:08) Take your shop to the next level with DN Solutions high-end machining solutions
• (21:19) Why the inbound calls from primes only came after the cert
• (23:04) The 50-employee, 50-machine ratio, and the plan to double through automation
• (29:42) Building a workforce: who can program and who’s still learning
• (31:11) 1,500 unique jobs a year and 70 percent new revisions
• (33:04) Why we’re leveraging Navu to answer tough questions
• (34:16) Should you separate prototyping from production?
• (36:06) Why Andrew stopped hiring high-end machinists and builds his own
• (39:52) Standardizing and automating smaller volumes of parts
• (42:35) The tension between shipping today and building for tomorrow
• (44:50) 4X growth in six years and why revenue can be misleading
• (47:55) How relationships and word of mouth built the customer base
• (51:34) Where AI fits in the shop today, and where it doesn’t yet
• (52:44) How procurement is a critical piece of the puzzle
• (56:54) Giving your team the right tools to make decisions
• (59:28) Andrew’s best strategic moves: the building, automation, and people
• (1:01:40) The macro outlook for machining demand in North America
• (1:03:53) Why we created Hire MFG Leaders (and why you should use it)
• (1:04:24) The trades comeback and why training your own people wins

Resources Mentioned

• Borg Design
• DN Solutions
• Navu
• Hire MFG Leaders
• Kieri Consulting

Connect with Andrew Borg

• Borg Design website
• Email Andrew