Dayton business defies economy

DAYTON, Ohio - As businesses continue to close their doors, one Dayton company is defying the odds, and growing. The latest achievement for Vector Composites, 3251 McCall Street, is possibly the most important since its inception. The company has been granted AS 9100 certification, which basically means that it's qualified to produce commercial aerospace parts.

The certification is the tool the business's founders have been waiting for. It will allow them to start bidding for jobs building airplane parts, and that means good things for Dayton.

"For Dayton that means more jobs, and it means that we're going to be able to hire some people and shed some light on the doom and gloom that GM and Delphi has brought on to the city," said Casey Benedict, Quality Manager at Vector Composites.

Benedict felt that 'doom and gloom' first hand. He was laid off from Delphi about a year ago.

"I had that fear of how am I going to make these payments, and so on and so forth, and what I did was I stayed motivated," Benedict said.

In less than a year he went from unemployed, to being the driving force behind Vector Composite's new quality achievement.

Now Benedict has the chance to offer opportunities to others. Vector will likely begin looking to fill three or four positions in the coming months as it works on landing more customers.

Dayton is making a transition from the automotive industry to aerospace, and Vector Composites wants to be at the forefront, Benedict said. It's already off to a good start by landing such a rare certification.

"To say that I was able to lead a team to get AS 9100 from no existing quality management system is an accomplishment in itself," Benedict said.