Saturday, July 16th, was an incredibly humbling day for Switch-Pros. We opened the doors to our brand new, 7,000 square foot building, and gave more than 300 visitors a look inside the facility where we make our Five Time SEMA award winning, off road switch panel systems. Some may say that a 7,000 square foot manufacturing facility is no big deal, but we beg to differ. When you are a team of merely a dozen people, who produce for a high-volume industry, and who started in a facility that measured less than 2,000 square feet in its entirety, it is hard to diminish the growth and dedication we have shown for building American Made, high quality, all solid state switch panels.
Award Winning LED Switch Panels
In case you haven’t seen or heard our story, let us share some of the history. The Switch-Pros brand made its debut at the SEMA Show in November, 2014. We brought home an impressive first place in the Best New Interior Accessory category, beating out countless other quality brands who were also vying for the title. At that time, we were an unknown in the auxiliary switch panel category of products. That win, the splashy trophy, the advertising that came as a result, and tireless hours of working to produce the best product for the most reasonable price, put Switch-Pros on the map.
Founded by husband and wife, Robert and Laura Muertter, the brand began to be recognized as a viable solution for those who needed a utv switch panel (aka offroad light controller). As the brand grew, the need for manufacturing and support staff grew, and, over the last 7 years, we grew from 2.5 staff members to thirteen. But there’s something more to our story than simply adding staff members to get the work done. We look at it more as growing our family. Nearly every staff member has some direct connection with The Muertter family. This may not seem important to some, but we believe this is one key component to our success. The level of ownership and pride our team has for our brand can only mean great things for the finished product. The camaraderie and cooperative spirit we have is one way we are able to efficiently produce for the high demands of the industry. Each person, on our staff, makes it his or her goal to guarantee our customers the best quality off road light switch panel that delivers the capabilities and reliability they have come to expect from Switch-Pros.
As a way to give back, and share an in-person experience with our story and our brand, we opened the doors to at least a few hundred visitors who were eager to get a look inside. The Open House offered vendor tents, and representatives, from Fox, Rigid Industries, PCI Race Radios, BoxoUSA
Tools and ProEagle off road jacks. All visitors were treated to tacos, snow cones, face painting, and tickets to enter bucket drawings for merchandise from our favorite vendors. One lucky winner walked away with a Switch-Pros SP9100, and another with a Switch-Pros RCR-Force®12 system. Other big prizes included a PCI Race Radios set of handheld radios, a ProEagle CO2 jack, Rigid Industries lights, a BoxoUSA utv tool roll, a UTV Stereo battery jump kit, and logoed merchandise from Fox, KMC Wheels and RPG Offroad.
Bluetooth® Equipped Switch Panel Manufacturer
The Open House also featured walk through tours, where our staff members took guests through the various steps of how we make our product. The tour highlighted the equipment we use for things like machining our aluminum enclosures, cutting battery cable and communications cable, wire cutting and stripping, crimping and testing. We stopped at each work station, and explained the steps and tasks we perform, which culminate into the manufacturing of our Bluetooth® equipped switch panel. Visitors were pleased to get a peak ‘behind the curtain,’ and see that our products are truly manufactured in house, and not simply imported or assembled here. The feedback, from those who walked through, was phenomenal, and all were impressed by the investments we have made in equipment to enhance our accuracy and efficiency.
In addition to tours and prizes, our Open House offered a mini car show. A bit like a “Show Us Your Switch-Pros” event, our parking lot overflowed with customer and vendor vehicles, all featuring various uses and mounting solutions for our Switch-Pros SP9100 and Switch-Pros RCR-Force®12 systems. The parking lot filled with everything from off-road race vehicles, to Prerunners and overlanding vehicles. It was amazing to see the creativity and ingenuity that vehicle owners and builders have, when it comes to integrating our off road switch panel into each unique build. The uses of our solid state switch panel range from acting as an off road light controller, for those racing across the desert in the dead of night, to a utv switch panel, for those wanting to control creature comforts (like heated seats), while cruising the dunes in their side by sides. We also saw an abundance of overlanding rigs (meaning rigs equipped for self-reliance while camping in remote areas), who use our LED switch panel, to control after-market lighting to light up their camp area. No longer are people using lanterns and flashlights. Rather, they are equipping their vehicles with rack lights, bumper and windshield pods, and rock lights, which serve dual functions. Useful for lighting up the path through dark forestry or dusty desert, those same lights provide perfect outdoor lighting for setting up camp and prepping meals at your remote destination. Also ideal is that fact that our Switch-Pros systems are Bluetooth® switch panels, meaning the lights can be controlled from around the camp area, by connecting with a smart phone. This is perfect for those who want to call it a night, and head up into their rooftop tent, before shutting off their camp illumination.
In case you missed our event, feel free to take the tour, via the link below.
