26-year-old specializes in fulfilling manufacturing gaps

A machine operator checks on the status of a laser cutting job. The 6-kW Mitsubishi GX-F ADVANCED fiber laser with its material handling automation also is able to run in a lights-out manner, which is usually over the weekend at Cali Raised LED. Images: Cali Raised LED

There’s no substitute for hustle when it comes to business. Perforated Metal Mesh Machine

26-year-old specializes in fulfilling manufacturing gaps

In high school, Blake Hamar got his first truck and decided he wanted to add some modifications. He went online and noticed a big price discrepancy between low-quality, low-priced LED light kits and high-quality, high-priced models. Already experienced at running a social media account dedicated to truck modifications and selling goods online, Hamar soon connected with a Chinese manufacturer looking to highlight its LED lighting products. Hamar, however, wanted to do more than that; he wanted to sell them.

He’d order five, sell five, and order eight. He’d sell eight, order 20, and continue the same pattern.

He’d hit the road, under the guise of visiting colleges that he might have interest in attending, and sell the LED products at agricultural and farm shows and hunting and fishing expos. When he’d return to school in Anaheim, Calif., he’d be sure to show school administrators visual proof of the university that he visited—just long enough to take a picture. Hamar’s future wasn’t on a college campus; it was a real-world education in entrepreneurialism.

Upon graduating high school, Hamar found that the online marketplace was flooded with similar LED light products as he was selling. More competition meant more of a battle to get noticed and stand out. That’s when he realized that no one was really offering mounting kits for those same LED lights. The competitors were selling the lights, but the buyers were pretty much left on their own when it came to affixing the purchase to the truck.

Hamar started to design the brackets and found someone with a small plasma table and manual brake in a garage to fabricate the mounting brackets used to hold the lights. It turned out to be the right idea at the right time.

“Once we started doing that, it just started to take off,” Hamar said. “People were excited to buy a full turnkey kit where they could bolt it right onto the truck and one hour later, they were good to go.”

As sales increased, Cali Raised LED, which officially started in 2014 while Hamar was still in high school, had to move on from the garage shop to a full-fledged job shop. That relationship only lasted for about a year before Hamar figured it might be easier to control the production of the mounting brackets by fabricating them in-house.

So in 2016, Cali Raised LED became a manufacturer as well. Hamar purchased a 5- by 10-ft. plasma cutting table and a used CNC press brake. “We just started cutting, bending, welding, and building things at a very small scale,” Hamar recalled.

In 2019, the company’s 2,800-sq.-ft. shop in Buena Park, Calif., was running out of room. Hamar and his three colleagues knew they needed more space, so they gave some thought to what might be the best course of action. Thinking about future growth needs, Hamar, like many other Californians, looked to the Southwest. At 20 years old, Hamar and his business were Texas bound.

The purchase of a 6-kW fiber laser cutting machine allowed Cali Raised LED to keep up with rising demand for its aftermarket truck accessories and to have enough capacity left over for contract work.

Simultaneously, the company was looking to add its first laser cutting machine. Hamar purchased a 2014 CO2 laser and had it shipped to its new 25,000-sq.-ft. shop in Fort Worth, Texas. He didn’t lay eyes on it until it arrived at the new address.

“We unpacked our stuff, showed up at our new building, and we’re like, ‘OK. It’s time to figure this out,’” Hamar said. “We got the laser hooked up and started blowing and going.”

Soon after, Cali Raised LED brought in another CO2 laser. The price was right for the cutting equipment, but the downtime was unexpected. The machinery kept breaking down, and it was difficult to get replacement parts. Additionally, consumables for the machines were not cheap.

“The other problem was that I really didn’t understand the machines. We just didn’t have the background,” Hamar said. “You would have to go in and manually do nozzles and adjust cut conditions.

“I don’t have a background in this, so I need to have equipment that I can understand.”

Hamar decided to invest in more expensive equipment because he needed better results and more consistent production from his part-cutting machinery. In December 2022, he purchased a 6-kW Mitsubishi GX-F ADVANCED fiber laser from MC Machinery Systems.

The new fiber laser eliminated the need for a lot of operator involvement. The machine’s cutting head adjusts the laser beam size, shape, and focus point for each type of material and thickness that enters the cutting enclosure. With the use of audio and light sensors, the machine’s control technology can adjust cutting parameters during cutting. If a subpar cut is detected, it can make required adjustments to regain the cut or improve the next cut.

The advanced monitoring capabilities of the laser also help to reduce maintenance responsibilities for machine operators. For instance, the nozzle monitor uses a camera system to monitor nozzle life. When the nozzle needs changing, the machine can enact an automatic replacement program that allows the defective nozzle to be switched out with a new one to eliminate excessive downtime.

“So we bought the laser, had it for like six months, and decided we needed automation [for material handling] on this thing,” Hamar said. “It was so fast. We were wasting so much time. It’s got this bad-ass laser, and we can only run it during the day.”

That led to the company adding Mitsubishi’s SmartFlex Element Type R automation system. Operators now can load sheets onto two upper shelves, each capable of holding up to 6,600 lbs., and have that feed the laser cutting machine. Laser-cut parts and the skeleton are automatically removed and placed below the material shelves, allowing the machine to run overnight without operators.

The Cali Raised logo marks this particular aftermarket truck bumper.

“We cut a lot of molle panels. They’re like these big, square cutouts from 10-ga. sheet. We put a ton of holes in them because people like to mount things like flashlights and first aid kits on them,” Hamar said. “Because they are so long, they take like an hour and a half to cut. We can load 40 sheets on a Friday evening that are running the hour-and-a-half nests, and we’re running them through Sunday. No stopping.”

Around the same time, Cali Raised LED also added a Mitsubishi Diamond BH hybrid press brake to help the bending department keep up with the parts coming off the laser cutting machine.

Just like in laser cutting, Hamar said there’s been a lot of trial and error when it comes to bending. That included a lot of parts being thrown away, but he knows that’s the price for learning and getting better.

“I just have a really open mind, and I know every day that we’re going to fail at something. So instead of getting down about it, we just learn from our mistakes,” he said.

The new equipment has enabled Cali Raised LED to dramatically reduce the lead times for its products. The company once had six- to eight-week lead times for most products, with some other specialty items, like bumpers, stretching out to 12 weeks sometimes. Now, if parts aren’t in stock and ready to ship from an on-site warehouse, the parts can be made quickly. Cali Raised LED has more than 600 different offerings in its product family.

To take advantage of the metal fabricating capacity at the shop, Hamar launched a job shop, Apex Fabworks, in July 2023. A former salesperson with a nearby service center has been successful in bringing a lot of fabricating business to the startup, and the additional business has been a good complement to product line manufacturing.

Most of the work fits within the thin-gauge work that Cali Raised LED was already doing, with about 85% of the job shop business falling into that area, according to Hamar. (The 6-kW laser cutting machine can accommodate 1-in. material, if necessary.) Also, the specialized job shop work can be tackled during the day shift, while the parts for the standard product lines can be cut on the second shift or even overnight.

The combination of work has kept the 40-person company busy. Hamar said he expected the company to hit $15 million in sales this year, and he plans for more growth in the future, particularly as the local oil and gas economy appears to have an insatiable hunger for metal fabricating services.

“Now that we’re in the job shop world, I meet these guys that own these other job shops, and it never feels like anyone really is competing with each other, which is interesting. On the direct-to-consumer side, it’s super cutthroat. We’re literally on calls at 1 a.m. pivoting ad dollars because another company made a change in pricing. Where in the manufacturing world, it’s just everyone kind of bouncing stuff off of each other. It’s super nice and friendly,” Hamar said.

For someone who values that sort of comradery, it’s no surprise that Hamar has tried to develop a similar culture within the walls of his own business. He claimed to have “almost zero turnover” and said it was related to young people growing in the business.

After the laser cutting machine purchase, Cali Raised added a new Diamond BH hybrid press brake to the bending department. The company hopes to add a similar brake in the near future.

With the average age of employees being in the mid-20s, the shop is home to people learning the ways of a fab shop for the first time. Hamar said he likes to hire young welders from nearby schools, such as Tarrant County College, where he has established relationships with faculty, and then introduce them to the other processes in the building. In a few months, a welder gains experience working a press brake, operating the laser cutting machine, and tending the two robotic welding cells.

“It builds loyalty, and it builds a really, really good work ethic into the people,” he said.

The equipment is in place. The workforce is ready to go. The commitment to improve is there.

Hamar said one of his major goals for the shop is to streamline material processing. He wants to minimize work-in-process and turn around jobs in 72 hours—from receiving the material to sending it out the door. That minimizes the chance of misplaced parts, keeps the aisles clean, and chips away lead times.

It also makes everyone more confident in being able to accommodate more business. That’s going to be a necessity if Hamar’s goal of becoming a $25 million-per-year company is going to happen.

The timing seems right. On the Cali Raised LED side of the business, Toyota just launched a new Tundra, its full-sized truck, and a Tacoma, its light-duty cousin, and is getting ready to unveil the new Four Runner, its popular SUV. Cali Raised LED can focus its energy on designing, prototyping, and then producing off-road accessories for these popular vehicles. (Cali Raised LED started with a focus on the Toyota Tacoma back in 2014, and the business has grown over the years by mainly focusing on those truck models.) But when that work is done, Toyota is unlikely to launch a new model for several years, allowing the company to focus on other truck models and use the best practices that it has honed over the years to build the Toyota business and target a new truck-loving customer base.

Simultaneously, Hamar believes Apex Fabworks is going to grow. Buoyed by quality fabricating work and supported by savvy digital marketing, the job shop’s reputation should continue to grow.

“We want to keep on banging out good parts and keeping everyone happy,” Hamar said.

Not too bad for a 26-year-old.

See More by Dan Davis

Dan Davis is editor-in-chief of The Fabricator, the industry's most widely circulated metal fabricating magazine, and its sister publications, The Tube & Pipe Journal and The Welder. He has been with the publications since April 2002.