RONAN — Wood products manufacturers across Western Montana have been having a difficult time since the pandemic, as wood prices have dropped.
The United States Forest Service (USFS) is aware of this, and to provide support and fuel innovation, the agency provides grants for wood product innovations.
Tech Woods USA, located in Ronan, was a recipient of two grants from the USFS.
Watch to learn more about Tech Woods USA:
The company started producing gun stocks in 2008, and ever since, they’ve been seeing tremendous growth.
“We went to SHOT Show in 2007, I think, our first part of 2008. And were fairly well received. We were told that we'd never be more than 7% of the business. And for Browning this last year, we're over 50% of the total stocks,” said Tech Woods USA President Marty Perkins.
Tech Woods USA stands out from the rest of the competition, which mainly consists of other manufacturers of guitar bodies and gun stocks worldwide, by using a unique curing process for their highly specialized maple wood.
The process utilizes heat and pressure to treat the wood.
“We are the only company in the world that thermally modifies three-inch material and then produces A2A quality products,” said Perkins.
“It's a steam-based oven and it's pressurized, so it's pressure, heat, and steam,” explained Perkins.
Tech Woods USA largely saw its increase in growth due to an oven that treats the wood, for which they received a million-dollar grant from the Forest Service’s Wood Innovations Program, covering a third of the cost of the oven.
This year, they received a $350,000 grant from the same program for a wood pellet boiler, which will heat the building and fuel the oven. The grant will again cover roughly a third of the costs of the boiler, although Perkins says they will still have to put money up front.
The USFS says that the Wood Innovations Program, which mainly provides funding to help operations address residuals, has assisted small wood products companies in expanding their reach by providing funding that they may not have access to otherwise.
This, in turn, has helped Western Montana’s wood product economy.
“Some grants have gone to post and pole mills to buy new equipment and upgrade. And these are a lot of family-run businesses. So they're installing more high-efficiency equipment, more safe equipment, a little bit more automation. Those post and pole producers are providing a lot of the fencing that we see and land across Montana in those ranches,” said Julie Kies, Wood Innovations Program lead for the US Forest Service.
The Wood Innovations Program helped Tech Woods USA become a respected worldwide manufacturer. The company currently only has employees from the Ronan area, with the hope of hiring more and bettering the community.
“We don't want to pollute. We're right in town here. So we really don't want to disturb the neighbors as much as we can. Getting that part of it so that they don't have the smoke. The emissions on this other system will make a huge difference,” said Perkins.
