Meet Joseph Everett, Vice President of Business Development, Wheelabrator Group, North America. Joe has spent his entire working life in the world of shot-blasting and knows it inside-out. What gets this seasoned shot-blast professional out of bed every morning and excited to head to work? We sat down with him to find out.
“The phone is always ringing!”
Joe, thanks for your time today. Tell us a bit about your role here at Wheelabrator.
I’ve been in this industry for over 37 years now and shot blasting is all I’ve ever done.
Shot blasting is unique – it gets in your blood. I love it because every day you are doing something different, it never gets boring. One day you could be working with a small foundry, the next, it’s a submarine manufacturer.
I was drawn to Wheelabrator by the incredible reputation the brand has in our industry, and I felt that, with my experience, I could make a real difference here. It has now been almost five years at Wheelabrator and I’m enjoying myself more than ever!
What’s been a stand-out lesson in your career, and how does it shape your work today?
It’s simple: treat people how you want to be treated. Integrity and reliability matter. I don’t like being disappointed, and neither do my customers. When I say I’ll do something, I do it. Keeping promises, whether timelines or deliverables, is essential to maintaining customer trust.
Communication is key. Align your schedule with theirs and notify them of any changes. If you say you'll be there at 10, be there at 10. Exceeding customer expectations is crucial.
Any recent equipment innovations that excite you?
Until recently, I was VP of Engineering and Product Development and still work closely with our Metelen R&D team at our Technology Center in Germany. They are always developing new products, exploring materials, or tweaking parts to extend wear life and cut operating costs.
I still find our machines’ capabilities fascinating. Picture this: blasting 40’ sections of ships’ hulls or cleaning a 200lb propane tank every seven seconds. It's amazing to be part of that.
What’s truly remarkable is how we integrate this expertise into our standard equipment range, improving the price-to-performance balance. Our global range of blast wheels embodies everything we’ve learned about them, narrowed down to three wheel families, the focus of constant R&D. Our upgrade kits apply many of our innovations to existing blast wheels.
Another innovation is Monitizer, our IIoT solution, which enables customers to monitor blast machines in real time, detecting process deviations early to prevent costly downtime.
Looking at your customers in the US, what themes and trends are you seeing?
Finding workers is getting more and more difficult for our customers, particularly in the foundry sector, and we are now helping them more with that challenge.
Through a Norican-wide program called TOPS, which was started by the team at DISA, we are providing a wrap-around service to our customers where we proactively service our machines for them on site with a dedicated schedule.
That takes the load off our customers' maintenance teams. We can go in quarterly or monthly to make sure the machines are inspected and serviced right when it’s needed.
Where do you think Wheelabrator can make the biggest impact?
In the foundry industry, Wheelabrator, together with our Norican technologies, offers unique solutions. For example, combining Wheelabrator with innovations from Simpson, DISA, and Monitizer creates a complete cradle-to-grave offering. I’ve recently been in meetings where all our brands were involved—an incredible team for our customers.
Simpson’s expertise in sand is exceptional, and DISA continues to set the molding standard, with a deep understanding of the entire foundry process. Adding Wheelabrator to their lines, especially a CT machine in a continuous flow environment, is hard to beat.
As we collaborate more, we enhance the service level for our shared customers. A team that sees the bigger production picture and makes all parts work together is unbeatable.