A local family-owned company is finding success and rapid growth despite the difficult economic landscape.

With a combined 70 years of metal fabrication experience, David Kahn, together with his brother Johnny and their father John, started Ironmen Industries in Winkler nearly 10 years ago.

David says the family dynamic became their greatest strength. "Each of us has our area of expertise... we've pulled that together and have worked very effectively... this has become even bigger than we envisioned."

The solid family foundation allowed them to quickly branch out into manufacturing and structural steel.

Then COVID-19 hit.

When the global pandemic saw many industries slow down, David says they had the option to rest on government subsidies, "but it went against everything we'd worked for, everything we'd trained ourselves to be."

Instead, they chose to make investments in people and product innovations, breaking into the mobile sanitation market in a big way with a new partnership.

"Every day you show up and take risks, you have 50 employees you need to keep busy, but the work has come our way," Johnny says, adding the entire company has caught a spirit of pushing through challenges.

"The employees... they often say, "let's get more work in, let's battle through." So we take risks, we jump forward, we see a new opportunity and we go for it."

The result? Their hot hand wash mobile station is making waves for solving problems at construction sites. The JobJon Portable Solution's engineers found a way to winterize the unit while keeping the design compact and rugged. The unit has a 100-gallon freshwater capacity and is able to be lifted into any work site.

Operating under the Ironmen Industries banner, JobJon Portable Solutions will help companies thrive under the "new normal" when it comes to sanitation at construction sites and public events.

However, as their company grows, David says it's becoming increasingly important to keep the spirit of the family-owned company alive.

"It does seem like it takes a lot of work to keep... you start to see employees as people there to get a job done and not as a family. That is the culture we're trying to protect and create here, that we're a family. We're working together on everything. It's not just one person that gets the credit, it's everyone."

The hot hand wash mobile station is making waves for solving problems at construction sites.