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[Press Release] Sanderson MacLeod’s Table Set for Retro-Future Innovation

Collaborative Steampunk Project Symbolizes Local Brush Company’s History

  • Renowned Steampunk artist Bruce Rosenbaum captivated by Sanderson MacLeod’s approach to brush innovation during recent visit
  • Rosenbaum, Pathfinder Vocational students and Sanderson MacLeod toolmakers donate time and resources to create functional Steampunk conference table showcasing and promoting Quaboag River Valley’s history and unappreciated business opportunities
  • Steampunk table incorporates recent technology, antique manufacturing tools, equipment and fixtures to symbolize the symbiosis between modern and traditional manufacturing

When local architect Robert Haveles suggested that Steampunk artist and ModVic founder Bruce Rosenbaum meet Sanderson MacLeod’s president Mark Borsari, he didn’t know their encounter would result in a functional art piece celebrating the region’s manufacturing history. “I had to get these guys together,” recounted Haveles, a principal at Palmer based Architectural Insights who, during a recent lecture at the Palmer Historical and Cultural Center, became intrigued by Rosenbaum. “Mark and Bruce are so different professionally, but their creative process and ongoing encouragement of others to push creative boundaries of innovation are the same. If our little community only knew the amount of unique industrial, manufacturing and transportation activities quietly happening in town, they’d be amazed.

After touring Sanderson MacLeod and their recently expanded Brush Innovation Center (BIC), Rosenbaum and Borsari felt a professional connection as well. Both, they realized, were currently living and working in Western Massachusetts and appreciate the creativity and talent that mechanical innovation demands. They also feel strongly that despite manufacturing declines experienced in the past several decades, the Quaboag Valley still possesses the extraordinary talent and Yankee ingenuity that once made it a vital part of New England’s industrial story. This belief, and an opportunity to educate their local community of its proud history and promising future put plans for a Steampunk conference table in motion.

The table is nearly 100% fashioned from long-retired brush making tools, automation equipment, and industrial revolution era antiques found in the company’s warehouse and local flea markets. Its construction would ultimately involve an unusual collaborative team comprised of local students, teachers, artists, tradesmen and Sanderson MacLeod toolmakers. Sanderson’s Jody Sawyer, John Dube, Josh Dupuis, Eric Costa and Kyle Jancaitis all generously volunteered their time and talents, logging overtime and weekend hours and local artist’s Brian Marselli, Veronica Gaudreau and Jim Su worked closely with Rosenbaum in its design and fabrication.

“I chose to move to this area because I wanted to share my passion for technical artistry with trade school students, other artists and talented young people,” said Rosenbaum. “The Sanderson Steampunk piece tells the story of how a local company came to be an industry leader in brush innovation and gave us a really amazing opportunity to engage with, and hopefully inspire, local students about what careers in modern manufacturing or art fabrication can be like.”

New to the Palmer area, Rosenbaum and his wife Melanie recently purchased and began extensive renovations (with Bob Haveles providing architectural guidance) to the previously unoccupied St. Mary’s Church in Thorndike. The mid-nineteenth century church will serve as the Rosenbaum’s personal home, complete with a fabrication workshop and viewing gallery for his Steampunk creations. That is, when they are not on exhibit in museums around the world. The Rosenbaum’s story and their ongoing renovation project were recently featured on the Netflix documentary series, “Amazing Interiors” (Steampunk Wonderland Episode 8).

According to Borsari, Steampunk’s history as an artistic movement made it the perfect medium for the Sanderson MacLeod conference table project. Steampunk, by definition, is the fusion of History, Art, and Technology. The root word of “steam” incorporates the common engineering STEM terms for applications (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) with one addition…Art. Essentially, for a piece to be considered “Steampunk”, it must repurpose and infuse modern technology into period, relevant antiquities and objects.

The table will be a central part of Sanderson MacLeod’s newly expanded Brush Innovation Center (BIC). The BIC offers proprietary sampling systems and prototyping equipment focused on reducing client brush development time and is where many of the largest and most progressive global brands in the cosmetic, medical, gun care and general cleaning markets find the assistance they need. Such engineers and designers travel from around the world to the Palmer company focused on developing new products requiring twisted wire technology. By specializing on providing the fastest “concept to market” prototyping and design assistance, Sanderson MacLeod offers these customers an edge in their highly competitive markets, allowing them to outpace their competition’s efforts by months, if not years.

“When it comes to being on the cutting edge of production capable twisted wire brush innovation and automation, every designer knows partnering with Sanderson MacLeod is critical”, said Christopher Tarling, CEO of Manhattan-based consumer product development firm MIXCreative, LLC. “Their specialization (in twisted wire brushes) is very unique. More importantly, the Sanderson team is very talented in quickly assessing which ideas can realistically be produced on a large scale… which is critical. I’m always impressed with how they’re constantly developing new concepts, many times before others in the field have even figured out what they’re doing now.”

Sanderson MacLeod’s long history (they celebrated their 60th anniversary in 2018) and storied accomplishments include the first commercially produced twisted-wire mascara brush, proprietary automation designs and supply integration solutions such as their newly launched inventory management system, ION. Recently patented products and processes include their ZTip protective brush tip system, a color bonded alternative to insert molded parts known as ZTip+ and a soon to be unveiled CIMA line of integrated molded mascara assemblies. The company domestically produces all of their products and employs approximately 120 dedicated people within its modern 137,000 square foot facility in Palmer, MA.

“Before meeting Bruce, I never thought our company would ever be involved with a Steampunk project,” laughed Mark Borsari recently. “But, that table’s come to represent not only our love of innovation but how we seek out inspiration from the most obscure places. It’s also become a great way to recognize the dedication, creativity and hard work all past and present Sanderson MacLeod employees. As this idea started coming together, just buying a traditional conference table started to seem much, much too ordinary.”

“I guess you could say this table’s home had to be at Sanderson MacLeod,” summarized Borsari. “I mean, it’s who we are.”

[Press Release] Sanderson MacLeod Innovation Center Expansion Nearly Complete

Twisted Wire Brush Leader to Strengthen Design, Development, Production Capabilities

Sanderson MacLeod Brush Innovation Center

  • Clients seek to utilize this state-of-the-art facility to explore and develop twisted wire brush concepts
  • The Sanderson MacLeod Brush Innovation Center (BIC) offers companies looking to collaborate access to industry leading brush designers, engineers, and innovation teams.
  • Sanderson MacLeod’s 60 years of brush making experience, guarantee brush development projects are completed quickly, on budget and ready for large-scale production.

“Innovation without the ability to produce is just a good idea. Innovation with execution equals business success … The BIC allows ideas to quickly evolve naturally, capturing momentum and preventing stalls in progress. When you put talented people in a room together with the right resources it’s astounding how quickly abstract concepts can become  production capable products.”

– Jody Sawyer, Head of Innovation on Brush Innovation Center development projects

Sanderson MacLeod announced today the expansion and anticipated August 1st, 2018 opening of their newly enhanced Brush Innovation Center (BIC). After nearly six months of construction, the new center will offer clients seeking innovation assistance the ability to turn concepts into producible products faster than ever before. Enhanced prototyping tools include state of the art video and communication systems, libraries of proprietary material, 3D printing and sampling machines. In addition, an expanded conference room, cafe, and dedicated office space are expected to offer a one of a kind experience for those traveling to the Palmer, MA facility.

Originally opened in 2015 with the goal of dramatically decreasing brush development time, the Sanderson MacLeod Brush Innovation Center (BIC) provides a one-of-a-kind experience catering to clients committed to innovation. The BIC also includes a collection of dedicated sampling equipment, allowing for real-time prototyping of a brush or applicator product. Using Sanderson MacLeod’s expert engineering staff, changes and improvements can be made until the product is perfected. Finally, blueprint and quality control documentation are presented to the client, providing an unparalleled level of production-ready, “go-to-market” confidence.

“Early on we knew the BIC was ideal,” cited company president, Mark Borsari, who continued, “we constantly focus on innovating the brush concept, design, development, production, and delivery process. Due to the response from our customers, we realized we needed an even larger, more capable facility. This expansion provides unprecedented development ability for our customers.”

For many companies, including those overseas, the new Brush Innovation Center’s ability to host global video conferences is a tremendous advantage. Using large screen displays and the latest video technology, companies can benefit from the BIC’s capabilities, without the need to travel to the Palmer, MA location. For those who work at the BIC in-person, the expansion includes additional meeting space, dining facilities, Quality Control validation stations and rapid prototype printing. The expansion of the BIC allows Sanderson MacLeod to continue to be a global leader in twisted wire brush manufacturing.

Sanderson MacLeod is a contract manufacturer specializing in domestically-produced twisted-in-wire products, including twisted-wire medical brushes, firearm cleaning brushes, cosmetic brushes and general purpose cleaning brushes. Established in 1958, the company employs approximately 120 people and operates a modern 137,000 square foot facility in Palmer, MA.

The Risks of Improper Medical Device Sterilization

Improper medical device sterilization can potentially spread life-threatening infections in hospitals, clinics, and doctor’s offices.

What is improper medical device sterilization?

Media coverage over the past five years has frequently and clearly shown that improper sterilization of medical devices, scopes, and equipment has the potential to spread life-threatening infections in hospitals and medical facilities. More recently, there have been reports of improperly sterilized medical equipment in outpatient facilities, clinics, and doctor’s offices. In other words, the health risks associated with infections from improperly sterilized and cleaned medical devices extends well beyond the traditional hospital environment.

Incidents of infection resulting from improperly cleaned medical equipment have become so serious that the Center for Disease Control (CDC) and the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) have issued an advisory. The recommendations found in the advisory suggest that hospitals, clinics, outpatient facilities and doctor’s offices should conduct regular audits of how their staff cleans, disinfects and sterilizes medical equipment as well as how the medical equipment is stored and

handled. Further, the advisories recommend establishing methodologies for handling problematic situations regarding medical device sterilization.

What are the risks associated with improper medical device sterilization?

It’s clear that improperly sterilized and cleaned medical devices pose a serious risk of patient infection, including the possibility of deadly infection. What may not be immediately evident is the secondary risk medical facilities could face by using unsterile equipment, the risk of litigation resulting from medical negligence.

Recent occurrences of improper medical device sterilization.

Recently, a US-based hospital placed more than 9,500 patients at risk for serious infection. The hospital had to notify patients going back more than 6 years and was placed under the granular scrutiny of the CDC. In another case, a US-based medical facility was inspected by an unbiased third party who found an array of problems and inconsistencies in the hospital’s protocols as they relate to medical device sterilization.

Unfortunately, these are not isolated cases. While it’s not the intent of this article to highlight names, there are many medical facilities that have had equipment sterilization issues and a large percent discovered the problems when patients contracted infections and became ill. While the solutions to the problem of improper sterilization are certainly not easy to implement, they are critical.

By leveraging the right combination of people, procedure and technology, hospitals and medical facilities can dramatically reduce or eliminate equipment sterilization problems.

What can be done to improve medical device sterilization?

So, we now understand the risks associated with improperly sterilized medical equipment and we’ve examined what the outcome can be if equipment remains contaminated. But what are some of the steps that can be taken to improve the sterilization of medical devices?

The CDC and the FDA have a set of recommendations for products and procedures as they relate to medical device cleaning. In those recommendations, a few elements stand out.

First, there is a recommendation that the “retention of debris in reusable medical devices should not happen.” Debris can be retained where there are scratches, fissures or other damage to the medical equipment. Interestingly, low-quality medical cleaning tools can often be the source of the scratches and other damage. That’s right, the tools used to clean and sterilize the equipment can actually cause the damage that results in debris retention. In the case of a medical equipment cleaning brush, the takeaway here is that the protective tip on the end of the brush should be smooth and will not separate from the twisted wires that make up the core of the brush.

Further, the FDA is taking steps to advance the science of medical device cleaning and sterilization. Included in this science is the types of cleaning apparatus that are used to clean medical equipment. An important factor that may be considered is the use of anti-microbial fibers in medical device cleaning brushes.

Products that have proven to be effective in medical device sterilization.

Sanderson Macleod is registered with the FDA and is proud to lead the way in medical device cleaning brush manufacturing. Our brushes are engineered to exacting standards, run through an extensive quality control process, and produced here in the U.S.A. The patented Z-TIP brush is specifically designed for the medical industry and offers a smooth protective tip that will not fall off. The purpose of this tip is to help protect and prevent equipment damage during the cleaning process. Moreover, Sanderson Macleod offers the option for customers to use anti-microbial fiber in their cleaning brushes, allowing them to take advantage of any and all materials that may further help in the sterilization process.

Looking to the future.

As we look to the future of medical device sterilization, it is clear that collaboration between the FDA, medical professionals, equipment designers and cleaning tool manufacturers is becoming a requirement. Once all interested groups are working together, the human component of medical equipment cleaning if fulfilled and the introduction of new, better technologies and processes can become a reality.