Jeff Major is the President of the United States Cutting Tool Institute (USCTI).  At mid-year 2022, the world continues to recover from the COVID pandemic. Fortunately, our industry has seen a nice recovery in business. The aftereffects of the pandemic in the form of inflation, higher energy and gas prices, continued shortages in goods, and labor issues continue to create challenges. Cutting tool manufacturers must navigate these barriers in order to remain profitable and meet customer demands.

The reshoring trend in manufacturing continues to accelerate based on the supply chain issues. Finding employees is one of the key problems for our business to keep up with manufacturing to meet the needs of our customers. We all have been searching for creative methods to attract employees and then retain them.

The United States Cutting Tool Institute (USCTI) was formed in 1988 and resulted from a merger of the two national associations representing the cutting tool manufacturing industry: the Metal Cutting Tool Institute and the Cutting Tool Manufacturers’ Association. The resulting organization currently represents a majority of the domestic cutting tool market.

Today, the USCTI works to represent, promote, and expand the U.S. cutting tool industry and to promote the benefits of buying American-made cutting tools manufactured by its members. These promotions, in conjunction with your company’s individual promotional efforts, serve to strengthen your business and the industry as a whole.

The Institute also works with prominent cutting tool and machine tool trade publications to expand awareness of its activities and to gain wider recognition for its members and their products. These promotional efforts result in greater stature for the Institute and its membership.