COMPANY HISTORY

Over 55 years ago, Brooks Barton Heise Sr. founded the company Heise Industries, Inc. The company started out in a 5,000 square foot rental space and his passion for engineering design and technical challenges continue to be basis of our values today.

Brooks was hired out of college by Hartford Empire in Hartford, Connecticut as a designer/draftsman. Hartford Empire manufactured the glass IS molding machine for blown glass containers. After World War 2 the United States received LDPE technology as war reparations from the German government. The US government offered it to Hartford Empire, Owens Illinois and Wheaton Glass Company. All three companies took the technology and started separate divisions to develop it further. Hartford Empire started a new division called PLAX Corporation, an abbreviation for Plastics Experimental, to work with the new material. The PLAX division would later be purchased by Monsanto and then later purchased by Silgan Plastics in the 1990s. Brooks was one of the designers chosen for the new division. The new division was located in Stonington, Connecticut. PLAX used the glass IS machine as its starting point to develop a machine to process the new material. Over time they developed a machine and a process to blow mold LDPE plastic containers and they successfully designed and molded the first plastic container in the world. The machine that was developed by PLAX is still in use today. Silgan runs the BDS machine which is a modernized version of the original. Even today, a double cavity mold is also referred to as a G-2, which is terminology from the Glass IS machine. In glass they refer to a double cavity mold as a “double gob” or G-2. Over the years Brooks moved into design and procurement of the blow molds. PLAX had an in house operation, but they also purchased blow molds from an outside vendor named Redman Tool and Die, Co. in New Haven, Connecticut. Brooks purchased molds from John Redman for many years. As the relationship developed, John Redman offered Brooks the position of General Manager of Redman Tool and Die, Co. Brooks accepted the position and became the General Manager in 1963. Within 1 year of Brooks taking over the mold shop, John Redman decided to close the mold shop and consolidate the business with another location he had in Kansas City, Missouri. Brooks decided to start his own business at that point. Brooks arranged a $10,000 loan and purchased the best equipment that Redman was selling at auction. He offered positions to 5 people from Redman Tool and Die and they all accepted. In the end, Redman Tool and Die ended up going out of business. Wanting to be closer to where he lived at the time, Brooks rented an industrial space in Berlin, Connecticut. On February 1st 1965, Heise Industries, Inc. was operational.