On July 16, 2021, Mellott invited a group of 11-to-15-year-olds to spend a day at its service and training facility.

Once in a while, a company has the chance to change lives or give back to its community, and nothing feels better than that.

Mellott had the opportunity to do just that on July 16, 2021, when it invited a group of 11-to-15-year-olds to spend a day getting some hands-on experience crushing stuff, flying drones, welding and of course, chowing down on some pizza and wings. The event was held at Mellott's service and training facility in Warfordsburg, Pa., and in Hancock, Md.

The day started at 9 a.m. with a few blasting videos to get things rolling with a bang. Jeff Rowland, manager of human resources, and Jim Levy, vice president/general manager crushing and service operations/crushing services, started the day off with some words of wisdom and an overall picture of what Mellott is all about.

"I am looking forward to seeing some of the participants become employees one day," Rowland said. "These types of events expose students to vocations that are available in their local community and allow our employees to demonstrate their expertise. It is a two-fold opportunity to recruit and build employee engagement."

After the opening words, it was off for a tour of the service area, where Levy took the kids on a service adventure. They learned about the ins and outs of what it takes to repair a crusher. Then they were chauffeured to Mellott's upper lot for live demonstrations of crushing equipment. Levy fired up the loader and moved tons of rock into the crusher, enabling the campers to see the rock go in the hopper and shoot out the conveyer.

Javier Garcia, regional sales, captured drone footage of the crusher in action.

"The success of not only our company, but our industry, is in the ability to introduce a new generation into the aggregates industry," Levy said. "I'm so proud of our team for looking at new ideas and programs to reach out to kids and introduce them to the variety of opportunities that exist at Mellott Company and the industry."

Next was a visit to the fabrication shop, where the campers had the chance to see a welding arc and a plasma cutter, but first, Jonas Smith, group leader machining, spent some time with the students to go over Mellott's number one value, safety.

Everyone was able to have something to take home from their visit to Mellott, as the engineers designed a plasma cut souvenir that the campers were able to see made right before their eyes.

Lindsey Bard, marketing coordinator, played a huge part in making this day happen.

"As I child growing up in this small community, I remember seeing the crushers sitting along the road and often wondered what they actually did. I loved that we were able to bring a group of students in and show them not only what the machines do, but why what we do here at Mellott is so important. Exposing interested youth to our company, the aggregate industry and the many different career opportunities that are available here was such a valuable experience for them. My favorite part of the day was seeing their eyes light up in interest and watching their curiosity expand as they learned about Mellott."

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