Local manufacturer finds niche with metal fabrication
Staff Writer
Published by: Daytona Beach News-Journalonline.com.
Making a replacement part for an automatic chicken plucker isn't a run-of-the mill job at Magga Products in Holly Hill.
But there is not much run-of-the-mill work at the custom-machined, precision-parts manufacturing company.
Development of a mounting system for rear shock absorbers of a custom motorcycle created by Roar Motorcycles in Daytona Beach is another of the recent contracts Magga Products completed. The unusual bike, a WildKaT, has a hidden dual shock suspension system that adjusts to a rider's height.
"Magga Products (also) was instrumental in the development of a vibration damping system for the foot controls, essential to the overall comfort of the WildKaT," said Roar's president, Kathleen Steele Tolleson.
From one-of-a-kind prototypes to batches of hundreds of thousands of parts, from medical pins to folding key cases, the company's 11 full-time employees and a part-timer use state-of-the-art technology to meet production.
"We basically fabricate metal parts," said the company's owner, 32-year-old Maggie Morgan.
But Morgan, a University of Central Florida graduate with a master's in business administration, said she's not the one who gave the 50-plus-year-old operation its heart.
Her late father, Rick Morgan, a hard-working Egyptian immigrant, founded the company. And the name "Magga" comes from what she called herself as a child, when her father had the business part-time in a New Jersey basement.
"That's what I called myself when I couldn't talk (well) yet. I would pretend to answer the phone, and organize his nuts and bolts," Morgan said. "He made very small parts to what we make now -- bolts and nuts for industries. He was extremely innovative and resourceful."
The Morgan family left Egypt in the 1960s. By 1978, her father left a full-time factory job. He moved Magga Products from New Jersey to a commercial facility in New York, Morgan said. She worked for her dad after school and during summers.
"We were relatively small. I would hang out and chat with the driver while my dad would load the delivery truck. I would watch machines and clean them," she said. "But my dad was very adamant that I get an education. It was the one thing he said nobody could take away from you."
She entered Brooklyn College and transferred to UCF when the family moved to Florida in 1994.
"I worked as a paid employee for five years for another company but then put in my notice and went to work at Magga," she said. "I was trying to help out in a sales role, then I was managing the office and doing administrative functions. My father would say, 'I need you to know you could do it without me.' I was too foolish to know what he meant until after he passed away. It was challenging for me."
Taking the helm of her father's company after his death in 2005 meant more than taking on the CEO title, Magga said.
"I think, above and beyond titles, it's more of roles," she said. "My dad was the kind of personality who would cut his hand, but tie it up and keep working. He was the first one here and the last one out. They don't like me running parts, but I will if I have to."
Her days are filled with sales, scheduling, customer contact and tech support.
Morgan didn't have to go it alone. She had the help and support of her husband, Magga President Ryan Jaisingh, 36, who worked for the company part-time before they married.
"I came to America at 14, to New York from Guyana," said Jaisingh, who attended a trade school in New York. "She moved here, and I moved two months after. I worked in the car industry -- Pep Boys, Auto Zone. Then I came to work for her dad part-time, then full-time."
One recent project everyone had a hand in was the creation of reverse-engineered chess sets as gifts to show support for Halifax Health Medical Center's new France Tower. While the pawns and other pieces are traditional, the rooks are replicas of the tower.
"Magga came recommended, and Maggie Morgan was very open to the idea," said Mike Jiloty of Lord and Lasker, the hospital's advertising agency. "When I described what I had in mind, she was very excited about the opportunity to make the sets and donate them, which was very generous. The craftsmanship was exceptional and attention to detail was impressive."
Morgan said the chess set was a labor of love that cannot be duplicated, since she has no rights to replicate the tower. But there is no less love in any project, be it the chicken plucker repair or instruments neurologists use to do brain surgery.
"It's very exciting to work with so many industries that have high standards," she said. "Every customer has a different personality and requirement. It keeps our days, months and years interesting."
audrey.parente@news-jrnl.com
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