Ask most people what we do, and the answer starts with metal stamping. Fair enough: stamping is where we got our start, and it’s still the process most customers associate with our name. But moving from Clow Stamping to Clow reflected a shop floor that had quietly expanded well past the press line, adding laser cutting, CNC machining, forming, welding, assembly, and in-house tooling under the same roof. Here’s what’s grown around the press line, and how it all fits together.
Stamping Is Where It Starts, Not Where It Ends
Calling ourselves a stamping company undersells what actually happens inside our facility in Merrifield, Minnesota. Custom metal stamping still anchors most of our programs, but stamped parts are often just the beginning of the manufacturing process. Depending on the application, a part might start with laser cutting, custom metal stamping, or another fabrication step, then move through CNC machining for tight-tolerance features, press brake forming, robotic and manual welding, hardware insertion, and assembly. Sometimes that whole path happens within a single production day. The real capability isn’t any one of those processes on its own; it’s how we combine the right ones for each program.
Precision Metal Stamping: Flexibility First
Precision metal stamping remains the starting point for most of our programs. Our punch presses, ranging from 60 to 400 tons, handle everything from small brackets to large structural components, and our in-house tooling keeps changeovers quick when a design needs adjusting mid-run. We organize our metal stamping services around short- to medium-run production, a deliberate choice rather than a limitation. Rather than chasing volume, we focus on parts that need close attention: tight tolerances, frequent revisions, or specialized materials. Custom metal stamping works best when our tooling engineers and press operators can respond quickly. That kind of responsiveness gets harder to maintain at a scale built around running the same die around the clock for a single part number.
Laser Cutting Sets the Pace Early
Laser cutting often enters our process before a part ever reaches the press. Our laser cutting services handle prototype runs, small batches, and geometries that would be costly to tool for early on. Fiber and CO₂ systems cut clean edges across steel, stainless, aluminum, and copper, cutting down on the finishing work needed once a part moves downstream. Our precision laser cutting also supports revisions mid-program: when a customer adjusts a hole pattern or bracket profile, our laser department can turn around updated parts without waiting on new tooling. This flexibility matters most in the early stages of a program, when specifications are still settling and speed counts as much as accuracy.
CNC Machining Fills in What a Die Can’t
Some features need a machine rather than a press. Our CNC machining services add precision bores, threads, counterbores, and other close-tolerance features to parts that started as stamped or laser-cut blanks — but not every machined part begins that way. We also machine standalone components from bar stock and other raw material. Some of those ship directly to customers; others get built into larger welded assemblies right here on-site. Turning, milling, and tapping run alongside our stamping, laser cutting, welding, and assembly departments, which gives us the flexibility to choose whichever path fits the part best. Machining doesn’t compete with our stamping capacity. It expands what we can produce under one roof.
Forming, Welding, and Assembly Bring It Together
Once a blank comes off the stamping press or laser table, and moves through any other value-added steps it needs, forming and welding are often next. We’re not limited to one forming method — automated presses, compound tooling, and a large press brake department all come into play, with the press brakes shaping flanges, channels, and returns using six-axis programmable back stops to hold consistent angles across a production run. From there, many parts move directly into welding, where our robotic and hand-welding cells combine to produce welded metal assemblies for brackets, frames, and structural components. Precision welding matters here because fixture positioning has to hold steady across hundreds or thousands of identical parts, not just the first one off the line. Assembly follows in the same building, with hardware insertion, fastening, and inspection finishing what began as a flat sheet of steel. We don’t treat any of these steps as a separate vendor relationship. They’re departments on the same floor, working from the same production schedule.
Why the Connection Matters More Than Any Single Step
Our 396,000-square-foot facility in Merrifield, Minnesota, houses every one of these departments, with automation woven throughout the way we manufacture. Automated press operations handle blanking, piercing, and forming; robotic and spot welding cells join parts with repeatable accuracy; automated sanding and material handling systems keep work moving between departments. Together, they raise quality, speed up throughput, and support a safer shop floor, and we keep adding to that automation as new opportunities come up. A part can travel from stamping or laser cutting to welding without a shipment in between, and our engineers across departments can flag a tolerance issue before it turns into a delay. Our custom tooling, designed and maintained in-house, adds another layer of control, since die repairs and adjustments happen on-site rather than through an outside tool shop. Fewer handoffs mean fewer chances for a part to sit in transit or wait on a second vendor’s schedule. For OEMs managing short- to medium-run work with frequent design changes, we’ve found that kind of control tends to matter more than raw press tonnage.
What This Means for the Clow Name
Our shift to Clow reflects this reality better than any tagline could. Modern Metalworks isn’t so much a new direction as an accurate description of a shop that already worked this way: stamping, laser cutting, CNC machining, forming, welding, assembly, and tooling, connected under one roof instead of scattered across suppliers. Reach out to us directly to talk through a project that needs more than a single process to get right.