The parent company is a conglomerate that boasted 2015 sales of nearly $1 billion, with about half of its revenue in the water blast business and the other half in hydraulics and fluid power, with its most prominent names in the latter being Wallvoil and Muncie Power Products. Muncie Power's top product is power takeoffs, and the firm also sells such goods as cylinder valves, pumps, motors and other hydraulic offerings.
But Interpump Group lacked hydraulic hose and fittings until it purchased IMM, and even then the offerings mainly were directed at Europe.
That will now change, according to Carey. Over the past year, the company worked to make all the product modifications needed to make it an “American-friendly brand,” he said, including such things as changes to packaging, specifications and reels.
Carey went to the factories in Italy last year, and since then there have been weekly conference calls with the staff at IMM to ensure that the products, branding and business plan were ready to go. During NAHAD, Carey and Vonigas manned a tabletop exhibit during the contact program, and also met individually with a number of prospective customers.
The two will be based out of Muncie, Ind., and will benefit from the resources of Muncie Power Products as a launching board for its North American efforts.
Carey started in the hydraulic hose business in 1995 with Aeroquip and was with the firm for 12 years, including through its acquisition by Eaton Corp. From there, he joined Manuli USA in 2007, another Italian firm that grew its North American business from scratch to become a substantial player in the market. He worked outside the industry for a year before being hired last year with Interpump.
Vonigas has 35 years of experience in the industry. He had stints at Aeroquip and a couple of distributors, including nearly 10 years at Hydraquip.
“I'm the factory guy and Steve is the distributor guy,” Carey said. “He understands the needs of the distributor, and I know how to deal with the factory.”
And while Interpump Hydraulic Connectors is a new name in the region, he said potential customers will have the security of knowing the firm has a 30-year history of reliability.
“Interpump wants to be a global company, and they want to complete their fluid power offerings globally, and hose and fitting is certainly a very significant portion of that,” Carey said. “Interpump intends to make more acquisitions in fluid power, specifically in hose and fitting companies worldwide. It has doubled in size in the last five years and intends to stay on that growth path with multiple acquisitions each year along with organic growth.”