Adam Hansen’s vision for his new batch-one cabinet factory, dubbed HCO 2.0, is coming into view. When completed, the facility is expected to be one of, if not the most automated kitchen cabinet factory in North America that can produce staggering numbers of cabinets-per-day and do so at lightning-fast speeds.

“I’m Adam Hansen, founder and president of Hansen & Company Woodworks and we are at HCo 2.0, and I am super excited to be here,” Hansen said to FDMC in an exclusive early look at the facility. “We started the building in August (2024), and we are in January right now. So, we are about seven, eight months into the build. We will get the (office) building inside of the building in about 45 days and then the equipment will start to arrive for install.”

Since that frozen day in January, equipment has begun to make its way from Italy, Canada, Germany and other locales to the St. Cloud, Minnesota, facility. In March, two essential pieces of the automated batch-one cabinet line arrived — the Biesse Winstore storage system and Dual Rover HD CNC routers. 

How it all started
In 2024, Hansen & Company Woodworks (HCo) marked Its 20th anniversary with the announcement of a significant expansion, increasing its casework manufacturing capacity by a staggering 400%. 

The jump from 150 cabinets a day manufactured at its current facility (see sidebar for more information) to a projected 500 cabinets per day is not just a scaling up of operations: it is revolutionizing how they do things at the company. 

The $20 million investment will inaugurate a state-of-the-art 92,000 square foot facility, boasting what may be the most fully automated frameless batch-one cabinet line in North America in which cabinet parts flow seamlessly through the production line with minimal human intervention.

Bring manufacturing back 
It was after the 2008/2009 recession when Hansen’s idea for the factory began to percolate. The company was primarily making cabinetry for the single-family housing market, and started to see more low-cost, imported Chinese case works coming into market as RTA flat packs.

At the time, Hansen was importing granite from China, and on a whirlwind two week trip to China got to see many factories and the “crazy amount of people” employed there. “They were winning the game against us on just sheer labor,” Hansen said. “Nothing was automated, and I thought that there must be a way that as Americans we can automate and be competitive. We cannot be that on the labor side, we are never going to be able to. And so, the wheels are turning, and we must bring this kind of work that has gone overseas back to the States. And we have to do it through automation.”

The idea began to further germinate during a trip to the LIGNA trade show in Germany where he got to see robotics and material handling equipment from a number of vendors including Bacci. On that trip, Hansen had the opportunity to tour Nobilia, a German company and Europe’s largest kitchen manufacturer, known for its intelligently engineered kitchens.

“That really got the wheels turning,” he said. “They had this three or four story tall picking [robotic] system. We were working in a dark room, and we just looked through the window and it is picking thousands of parts.” 

Soon, plans started to take shape. On the wall of Hansen’s simple office hung the latest schematic of the sophisticated production line. The company created a splash in Summer of 2024, when it generated a video that showcased how the system would work. The line begins with the Winstore automated panel storage and retrieval system that can store up to 5,000 panels, sized up to 5 x 12 feet. Panels are fed to two high speed Rover B HD’s, which feature two router spindles with 14 tool changer, and two drill blocks on the machine.

The routers are estimated to be able to machine 300 panels per shift and up to 3,000 parts per shift. Cut parts are offloaded by Automatech Bacci robots. Because of robotic unloading, the machines are basically cutting constantly. There is no waiting for people to get product off the router. 

Cut components are then directed to the edgebanding loop, which, according to the video, will be able to edgeband at a rate of 11 edges per minute or nearly 12,000 edges per shift. 

The Biesse edgebanders will feature a 24-color material change system that automatically match the edgeband material to the job. It will edgeband up to 1.5 inches thick  with 3mm banding that is adhered with PUR glue. 

Bacci robots will then sort the parts and store them so that they will be ready when a particular job needs to be assembled.
When the assembly department is ready to do a customer’s job, Automatech robots will grab parts that have been finished, edgebanded and routed. The parts will automatically be directed to one of three hardware insertion areas — one area for drawer slides, hinge plates and glue; another for dowels and pin insertion; and finally hinges, bumpers, and drawer clips. 

All of this activity occurs without human intervention. And, the entire process is timed so that parts are delivered in a perfect sequence to that the assembly person will assemble the box, before it goes to a feed-through clamp. At the same time, cabinet doors and drawers are being prepared with hardware installed such as hinges and rubber bumpers for soft-close drawers.
The cabinets will finish being wrapped, palletized, and wrapped again ready for shipping. 

According to Hansen, boards will come in docks at one end of the massive facility and with little human intervention and will be shipped out of four loading docks on the south side of the building, which all the completed cabinets will then go out.

While the expansion will create at least six new jobs, HCo’s vision extends beyond mere job creation. The focus is on elevating the value of work for employees, enabling them to earn more for themselves and their families. Achieving this involves developing a workforce skilled in industrial engineering, robotics, process engineering, and technical manufacturing — Skills integral to HCo’s 2.0 factory. Aligned with this vision, HCo is investing more than $120,000 in educational programs and training through partnerships with local higher education providers. The advanced skills acquired will create an opportunity for a 20% wage increase.

“We’re excited to watch the team thrive in their new roles and look forward to expanding the team as we seek local talent,” said Jeff Bergstrom, production manager. In this artistic rendering, machined parts are stored by robots.

Getting orders out the door during construction

Increasing worker skills benefits the company and worker's pocketbook

Adam Hansen, owner of Hansen & Company Woodworks’ has some firmly held beliefs. One is bringing manufacturing back to America. The second is to improve He also wants to increase wages of his shop employees. The two ideas, in fact, work hand and hand.

“My thesis on that is you can only increase your [company] worth by two ways, producing more, or producing more value,” he said. “And so, if we put a guy on a saw, there's only so much he can do at the saw. He's limited by what the saw can really do, so his wage is limited. We decided we need to invest in training and help make them more productive.”

Hansen has set aside $120,000 to help fund educational programs and training that will help existing staff develop skills in industrial engineering, robotics, process engineering and technical manufacturing. The advanced skills will create opportunity for a 20% wage increase, Hansen said. 

The company has partnered with a local school, St. Cloud Technical and Community College, to increase worker skills. Currently, they have six people attending the school to improve knowledge and skills about automation. . “It is the first program they helped put us together,” he said. “We wanted their wages to increase. To do that, we want to increase the skills and value they bring to the workplace.”