Rich and I are sitting here eating a pizza tonight checking e-mails and I figured I would catch you to speed on what we did at work today…. See the attached you tube video!

Day three is all about powering up the machines and making spindles turn!
Thanks for reading
John

For those whom have been reading this blog for a few show cycles, I have had interns the summer of IMTS, Olivia our third in 8 show cycles. She is a Senior at TCNJ, here in NJ. She has taken my instructions at the beginning of the summer and executed them flawlessly. Here is her blog post that I asked her to write at the end of the summer:
When I started my first day at Royal Master Grinders, I was as nervous as anyone else starting a new job. I remember being very timid in this new place surrounded by new people that had already been here for years and here I was, the college intern who didn’t know anyone’s names or what to do. Looking back, boy do I feel silly that I was ever scared. Within a few short days, I could already feel this work family accepting me as their own. John Jr. threw me right into the work atmosphere and there was never a dull moment. Working mainly with the upcoming IMTS details, I quickly learned more than I ever thought possible. Not only did I learn about the makings of a great trade show exhibit, but also the extreme precision and hard work that everyone in this office exhibits to keep things running smoothly. I think one of my greatest lessons was learning the true qualities it takes to be a leader. This does not mean someone who barks orders and hangs back from the real work. A leader is someone who is involved in every aspect of their projects. A leader is someone who knows how to take command and gain the respect of all of their employees. A leader is, most importantly, someone who genuinely and whole-heartedly cares about their work and all of those who are involved in it. These were the qualities I saw every day at Royal Master Grinders.
Unfortunately, I have to return back to school before I can truly see the outcome of the intense work that has been put into IMTS. I was most looking forward to seeing the loading of the huge truck to be shipped to the show! For anyone that is even remotely familiar with the Royal Master Grinders work family knows how hard of a goodbye this will be for me. From Stacy singing everything she does, to Bob’s never-ending witty comments, ...

For those who have been following the Memmelaar’s over the last 65 years of Royal Master Grinders my father and I are both into cars. We both work on and Drive Pre 1915 cars, sometimes more work on more than drive. My daughter Ava was hanging out with me in the garage and we were talking the other night and she asked why I didn’t have a home office in the house like her friends dad. She also asked why that when I do work at home at night I set my laptop up on my workbench in the garage. I have to say I was stumped. I took a photo and sent it to a friend of mine, he saw nothing odd that I would do something like this. The more I thought about it the more I realized that my dad and I still love to get our hands into projects, we both call it simply “digging in”. John Sr will still be in Royal Master’s shop working on a machine, adding his expertise to a project because there is not much he has not seen in his many years at Royal.
The parking lot was quite a scene today at Royal Master as Alex, Ryan and myself had two machines plus our booth and our skid of support materials out in the parking lot. At one point the FEDEX guy had trouble reaching our loading dock. We are to that point in the show cycle that we are seeing the finish line with a number of projects and just seeing the midpoints of others. Its crunch time. I break the show cycle into thirds. The first third is the hardest, the show prep. This starts in January, and ends in our case August 27th when the shipment is picked up.
The next third is the set-up at McCormick place and the actual show. This part of the process is the most fun for me as I get to look at everything that our team accomplished, the customers reactions and the sales generated. I enjoy watching the customers look at our product offerings, and during the times that we engage with them, we often talk at dinner about the feedback on a certain product we brought or feeder design we engineered.
The last third is the minute the show closes. For anyone that has never been at ...