The Asheville Area Chamber of Commerce offers a quarterly Manufacturing Mornings event hosted by area manufacturing companies to highlight the contributions of the region’s manufacturing industry. 

With more than 300 companies contributing $22 billion annually to the regional economy, manufacturing is a large focus area of the Economic Development Coalition. Jay Richardson of New Belgium Brewing Company said it is important to bring in new manufacturing companies as well as expand what is already here, and attributes some of the success of his beverage manufacturing company to the way the Chamber and EDC work to enhance relationships and improve experiences for local manufacturers.

The June 2023 Manufacturing Mornings event was held at Thermo Fisher Scientific, Inc in North Asheville. Thermo Fisher manufactures a variety of products including ultra-low temperature freezers, high-tech vacuum ovens, and cooling systems for MRI equipment and Tesla chip manufacturing.

Director of Operations and Site Leader Kirk Ritchie said he loves manufacturing, and is also grateful for the support of the Chamber. New to Thermo Fisher Scientific, Ritchie has been working in this position for about three months following several years at GE Aerospace in Asheville. He said Thermo Fisher Scientific brings in around $44 billion of revenue annually across its locations worldwide, hires 125,000 employees across its variety of brands, and reinvests $1.5 billion annually into the company and its employees.

The company’s main center in Asheville comprises 300,000 square feet, producing 18,000 individual parts per day with 200 employees directly involved in fabrication.

Thermo Fisher Scientific touches all lifecycles of any drugs new to the market. Beginning in the life sciences lab to fabricating refrigeration for storage and transportation to testing and diagnostics, Ritchie said the company holds a huge corporate responsibility. 

At the forefront of the COVID-19 pandemic response, the company’s ultra-low temperature freezers were manufactured at a rate of 600 per week during the height of the pandemic, up threefold from the usual 200 per week rate of production before the pandemic. Staff numbers increased from just over 500 to 987 at the peak of production.

“Our products were used to store or ship more than four billion vaccines throughout the pandemic,” Ritchie said. “This was a huge effort from our team, and it would not have been possible without the help of community leaders in Asheville.”

Thermo Fisher Scientific is also committed to its environmental focus. The Asheville location has been a zero waste-to-landfill site for four years — the first of all the company’s locations to do so.

The company is also invested in its communities, and according to Ritchie, invests in local colleagues, partners with A-B Tech for employee retraining, and places a high emphasis on STEM learning in the community by being involved in area schools to help generate students’ excitement and knowledge of future possibilities in STEM industries. 

“Our Community Action Council held 19 events last year,” Ritchie said. “We take pride in giving back to our community.”