Scrap Industry News

Commercial Metals Company (CMC) of Dallas has announced the retirement of Harry Heinkele, president of CMC’s Secondary Metals Processing Division, after more than 24 years. Former CMC Chief Operating Officer Alan Postel has now assumed the role.

Heinkele, 72, began his career with CMC in 1980 having been previously employed by NL Industries. He was named the head of the Secondary Metals Processing Division shortly after joining CMC. He is credited with restructuring the division to emphasize strong and efficient regional operations with expanded capacity. Heinkele’s career at CMC culminated with the "best-ever" year for the division in fiscal 2004.

Alan Postel joined CMC in 1974 as a manager trainee and has assumed positions of increasing responsibility in the division, having been named COO in March of 2004.

"We will miss Harry. Harry has made a major contribution to the growth of CMC’s Secondary Metals Processing Division over more than two decades," says CMC chairman, president and CEO Stanley A. Rabin.

"CMC is fortunate to have someone with Alan Postel’s background to effect a seamless management transition," Rabin says.

Commercial Metals Co. and its subsidiaries manufacture, recycle and market steel and metal products, related materials and services through a network of steel mini-mills, metal recycling facilities, steel fabrication and processing plants, construction-related product warehouses, a copper tube mill and marketing and distribution offices in the United States and in some overseas markets.

OmniSource Corp., Fort Wayne, Ind., and Cohen Brothers Inc., Middletown, Ohio, have announced an extension of their agreement with Worthington Industries Inc. to fulfill a scrap service contract that allows the two companies to serve Worthington’s 47 facilities throughout North America through a joint venture known as Industrial Scrap Consulting LLC.

The service contract covers a broad range of services related to scrap handling, logistics and marketing arrangements.

"Worthington’s scrap byproduct is a non-core business and outside our expertise," Perry D. Roark, scrap initiative manager at Worthington Industries, says. "This centralized scrap management initiative allows Worthington Industries to focus on our core business while allowing our partners to concentrate on their expertise—the management of our scrap byproduct, for the benefit of our program."

Donald L. Zulanch, a vice president with Industrial Scrap Consulting, says the arrangement has provided downstream benefits for Worthington Industries and some of its customers by offering "a comprehensive, centrally coordinated scrap management program."

Richard A. Gertler, also a vice president with Industrial Scrap Consulting, says "Worthington has realized greater net scrap revenues for its scrap marketed through the OmniSource and Cohen Brothers joint venture."

Worthington Industries is a diversified metal processor with annual sales of more than $2 billion. It makes automotive aftermarket stampings, pressure cylinders, metal framing, metal ceiling grid systems and laser-welded blanks, among other products.

OmniSource Corp. is among the nation’s largest scrap companies, handling more than 6 million tons of ferrous scrap annually and annual sales of more than $1.5 billion.

Cohen Brothers Inc. is an 80-year-old scrap company that is among the 15 largest in the United States, with more than 200 employees working from locations in Ohio, Indiana and Kentucky.