An Indiana producer that made its name in high-margin, custom precast units for an industry hit harder than most since 2001 has staked its future on product diversification. Hartford Concrete Products Inc. of Hartford City remains among key players in controlled environment vaults (at or below grade) and manholes for telecommunications customers. But thanks to increased lifting capacity and a 13,000 sq. ft. plant expansion completed this spring, the company is now equipped to deliver heavier precast units (30- to 40-ton range) for utility tunnels and trenches.

“We are ready for a telecommunications market rebound soon, and in the interim have balanced our capabilities across a few niche areas,” affirms Hartford Concrete President J.D. Collins. “When the telecom business slowed, we saw a window to overhaul our main plant and identify additional cast-in-place concrete applications where customized precast is a good alternative.”

Tunnel and trench pieces, pre-finished with ventilation-framing and conduit races, cater to contractors building infrastructure for universities and chemical or pharmaceutical plants, Collins adds. Hartford Concrete's two largest jobs in this market have been tied to Purdue University's Alumni Hall Building in West Lafayette and Eli Lilly's LTC North facility in Indianapolis.

As the move into heavier, specialized precast continues, the producer is building on a five-year old certification strategy that has instilled discipline at the plant level and additional confidence among long-time customers like SBC and Verizon. Hartford Concrete is preparing to complete audits this summer for certification under ISO 9001-2000, a quality assurance standard developed by Geneva-based International Organization for Standardization (ISO).

In 1999, the company became one of the first in concrete production to attain ISO 9001 certification, indicating that Hartford Concrete's internal quality management conforms to a generic ISO system. The more advanced ISO 9001-2000 standard requires greater attention to developing and improving production and process metrics, along with tighter tracking of their implementation (separately, see this month's Editorial, page 4). Concurrent with the audit process, Hartford Concrete is continuing research and development on product applications which, like the tunnel and trench sections, extend precast to new turf.