More room to grow: Interroll invests five million euro on Wermelskirchen site expansion

Interroll is investing five million euro to expand its Wermelskirchen site. The project is scheduled for completion by fall 2017. Wermelskirchen is the site of the group's global Center of Excellence for conveyor rollers. It will receive a new 1600 square-meter test bay, an additional floor of offices and a modern cafeteria to serve the 260 persons presently working at the location. The added capacity will enable the company to improve product performance testing, develop new offerings and boost the production volume of its RollerDrive type driven conveyor rollers.    

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"As the world's leading manufacturer of conveyor rollers for internal logistics, our most important tasks are to develop and market innovative products, manufacture them efficiently and offer attractive jobs. The aim of this investment is to enable us to continue steadfastly along this path," says Armin Lindholm, managing director of Interroll Engineering GmbH. The new test bay, which will cover an area of 1600 square meters, which is equivalent to the size of two handball courts, will be completed first and will boost the total manufacturing area by almost twenty percent. Here the company will conduct interval tests on both newly developed and proven products in line with its groupwide zero defect strategy. The aim is to ensure top performance even in critical applications. "Quality and innovation are Interroll's top priority," says Lindholm.

The additional space will allow Interroll to expand its production capacity. Interroll is planning to more than double the production volume of the RollerDrive conveyor roller drive by 2023. The extension also translates into new jobs over the course of the next few years. Says Lindholm: "We plan to hire between sixty and ninety persons between now and 2023." The current initiative includes building a cafeteria that will seat about 170 people. Construction will start in fall 2016. After it is completed in spring 2017, work will begin on adding another story, comprising a total area of 600 square meters, to the existing office building.

The investment at the Wermelskirchen location is part of Interroll's strategy of building modern factories to drive growth. Between 2008 and 2011, the group invested about 8.5 million euro in the tradition-rich Wermelskirchen facility, where Interroll was founded in 1959. The renovations were completed without shutting down production. Over the past two years, Interroll invested about thirteen million euro in its Baal-Hückelhoven site, situated on the left bank of the Rhine River. Today that site is the headquarters of Interroll's Academy for internal and external training programs, as well as home to the group's ultramodern drum motor plant and the Interroll Research Center.