Rockton’s Taylor Company approaching 100 years in business

ROCKTON, Ill. (WTVO) — Taylor Company first started operating in the Stateline in Beloit. Now based in Rockton, the company is about to celebrate a major milestone.

“I’ve been here for about a year and a half and I love it,” said company president Korey Kohl. “People here are awesome. It’s been a great company to work with, great team to work with. Taylor has been here in Rockton since 1949, actually began its roots in Beloit. 99 years old, so next year we’re celebrating our 100 year anniversary.”

Kohl gave us a look at how they make soft-serve ice cream machines.

“This is a plasma laser,” he pointed out. “This is where we do a lot of our sheet metal fabrication. This is the very beginning of the process. We have several different fully automated pieces of equipment. When Taylor was purchases be Middleby Company about 6 years ago, there was a lot of investment made in this part of the factory in the sheet metal fab and the equipment and making things efficiently and effectively.”

Next is forming the metal with a press brake.

“What is does is it helps walk the operator through presets, where to set the part, where to form it to make sure we get the exact same part every time,” Kohl said.

Taylor’s fabrication department produces thousands of parts a day to make soft-serve and shake machines, clamshell and flat-top grills and more.

“This is an automated French fry dispenser,” he showed. “This particular one is going to Saudi Arabia. Taylor has 121 different distributors that we work with directly in 151 different countries.”

Kohl says there’s a ton of pride flowing through the building and that workers here tend to stick around.

Lines 1 and 3 supervisor Stacy Tyler showed us the assembly process. She’s been with the company for 20 years.

“When I first started, I was surprised to see what it starts out as, and what it finished at just how everything works,” Tyler said.

She took us through the many assembly stations as teams put the machines together.

“It’s a lot, but it’s really cool how it all comes together,” she said.

After assembly, the team tests the machines. Then they’re ready for the real world.

Kohl says the company is positive about its future.

” We’ve got 500 employees today. I’d love to have 750 employees, new innovation, new products,” he said. “We do all the engineering, developing, testing here at this facility – take the skills sets of the group as a whole and just take it to the next level for the next hundred years.”