Bergeron President Making His Presence Felt
WESTFORD, MA – June 25, 2025 – Dave Giampa has only spent two years at Bergeron Machine as the company’s president. The adverb only seems appropriate not to diminish the length of the tenure, but to emphasize how much the company has accomplished in 24 months.
Under Dave’s tutelage, Bergeron Machine has overcome several challenges to experience tremendous growth.
”Dave has been our change agent at Bergeron,” explained Bill Canning, Compass Vice President & COO.”We acquired a really good shop from prior owners Mark Kelly and Sidney Kuo. Dave has been the guy to drive Bergeron forward, doing things that were not done before.”
The biggest driving force behind Bergeron’s growth the past two years has been the secondary shifts the company has established.
A few months into Dave’s tenure, the operating company began a second shift to expand its machining hours. Then last fall, Bergeron started a weekend shift.
The company has been running seven days a week for more than eight months, which Dave said has given Bergeron the opportunity to produce at a much higher level.
“In the past, Bergeron Machine has had to rely on overruns and overtime to get additional parts out,” Dave said. “Now we can do it with a minimum amount of overtime, still have the opportunity to do overruns, a few extra hours per night, once the second shift leaves.
“There’s really no downside to making this move. It really has helped us a lot to keep production rolling.”
Bergeron has four employees on the second shift. The company moved two of its employees onto the shift to give it experience. Then, Bergeron hired two new employees to add manpower.
The extra shifts have allowed Bergeron to overcome some of its older machines experiencing maintenance issues. The company has shut down five machines due to age since Dave’s arrival.
“The secondary shifts have been a huge difference for us. It really has. To be honest with you, I don’t know where we would be right now without those shifts,” said Dave.
“If we didn’t take the steps that we had taken, we would never be able to keep up with demand.”
As important as those shifts have been, Bergeron will soon have another driving force for growth – a unique, new piece of equipment.
In August, Bergeron expects to have a new multi-spindle Swiss machine producing high-volume parts. Once set up and after employee training, the eight-spindle machine, which has seven separate tool stations, will significantly enhance capacity while reducing lead-times.
“It’s a huge time saver, and it will allow us to produce parts in volume very quickly,” said Dave.
The machine will also give Bergeron an edge over its competition, especially in its region of the United States.
“It’s going to give us the opportunity to really do something completely different than what we’ve done in the past,” Dave added. “It will enable us to have that throughput on volume jobs that we don’t have now.
“So it kind of separates us from the local competition. There aren’t that many of these machines in the US or at least in New England.”
Dave and his team are overcoming unique challenges with the machine’s installment. The Bergeron facility was not equipped with the proper electricity to run the new multi-spindle Swiss machine.
The electrical services to give the building adequate power will take 9-12 months. In the meantime, Bergeron will power the new machine with a generator the company purchased.
Dave suggested the process is more complicated than any machining purchase he’s dealt with previously in his career. But supervisor Danny Du is handling the logistics of the machine’s arrival and the new electricity installment. Production manager Bory Vuth will be responsible for training employees on the new equipment.
Only two years ago, both Bory and Danny would have needed training themselves with the new machine. But under Dave’s leadership, both have developed into leaders at Bergeron.
Dave described the growth of the company’s people such as Bory, Danny, new office manager Joey
Bory, Danny and Joey have all earned the Compass Precision Employee of the Month title over the past two years.
“We’ve had to replace some very important people who were here. We brought in some new people and we promoted from within, and watching these people grow into managers is definitely my greatest accomplishment here,” Dave said. “We’ve made managers out of people who had never done that before.
“When you see people grow and do something that they never thought they could do and become good at it, it’s incredible.”
Over the past two years, Bergeron has also done some other things to modernize or improve its shop.
The operating company has begun using a new ERP system to help with organization. Dave also appointed one person in charge of stock. Before, any Bergeron employee had access to the company’s stock whenever they wanted.
Now, stock is closely monitored and allotted only for necessary purposes.
This year, Bergeron has also reorganized the layout of the shop floor. The company removed any machines no longer running to create more space and then shifted other machines to new places to create additional room for organization.
“It may not seem like much, but it makes a big difference with the way the operators can do their jobs,” sai
Over the next year, Dave identified two significant goals he would like to see Bergeron achieve – further develop its customer relationships and add more machines.
Bergeron plans to fulfill high-volume orders from a new major aerospace customer with the multi-spindle Swiss machine. That unit will also run high volume parts for the Compass operating company’s two biggest customers.
Dave said he wants Bergeron to find other clients in the aerospace industry as well.
To service those customers, Dave sees Bergeron adding more equipment. Although the multi-spindle Swiss machine is a huge step in the right direction, it won’t make up for the five lost machines by itself.
Dave sees the need for more conventional pieces of equipment to run orders not as well suited for the multi-spindle machine.
The sky appears to be the limit for Bergeron, especially after the company has already accomplished so much in only the last two years.
“Dave has accomplished everything we envisioned Bergeron could do in the short-term,” said Compass CEO Gary Holcomb. “Now, with the new multiple-spindle machine coming, and making parts for new aerospace customers, the future is very bright for Compass in New England.”