I’m Kathy Stillman,  Director of Sales and Marketing for Conard (and Queen of All She Surveys…at least in my own mind).  If you are looking for the top blogs to follow, try here .   If you have a streak of geek and some curiosity about things we can do with metal and acid, this might be the place.

You do what?

When people ask what I do for a living, I tell them, “I sell shiny metal parts.”  The usual reaction is the scrunch-faced forward-leaning  “huh?”

And then I say that I work for a specialty metal fabricator that does photo etching, which doesn’t usually help  the situation.  “Well, what do you make?” is often the next question.  My answer: “everything from satellite components to Christmas tree ornaments.”  At this point, some people think that I’m trying to mess with them, and it can get a little tense.

But, seriously, folks: it’s true.  We do make satellite components and ornaments and bookmarks and jewelry and  components for cell phones and MRI scanners and ball bearings and pipeline sensors and MEMS (a whole ‘nother discussion) and semiconductors and RF and microwave stuff and telescopes and airplanes and diagnostic equipment and model railroads and mass spectrometers and smoke detectors and coffee makers and supercomputers and elevators and fuel cells and electronic components and stenography machines and relays and de-icing boots and, and, and….. You see my problem?

If I worked for Hershey’s Chocolate, things would be easier to explain.  (Although, I would probably want to choose my words carefully and not just blurt out “I sell Kisses…”)

In the course of a year, we’ll run 3000-some jobs through our plant in Glastonbury, for several hundred different customers.  Some of the parts are so tiny that 40,000 of them can be made from one square foot of metal and other individual parts are up to 24″ x 66″.  And everything in between.

On any given day, I might talk to a jewelry designer, a mechanical engineer, an architect, a physicist, and a guy who designs stuff for model railroading….among others.

That’s the thing with photo etching.  It has so darned many uses that it can’t be easily categorized.  So, if you have questions, just ask.