All About Us
In 1972, Lynn Kitchen, along with his partners and some of his sons, began building a cement building in Salt Lake City, UT. When construction was complete, an ornamental iron railing business leased the building. The railing manufacturing company soon found itself in deep financial trouble. Lynn Kitchen, his partners, and his sons agreed to help this company out of its financial problems, in order to regain control of the building. Once the debt was paid, the railing company decided to close up shop. With the newly gained knowledge of metal work and iron railing fabrication, the company Metal Craft Products was started by Lynn Kitchen and his partners. The company continued to build ornamental iron railings. In 1975, boat trailer fabrication was added to supplement the work, and the company has been building boat and custom trailers ever since. In 1978, the name was changed to Metal Craft Trailers, Inc., as the company phased out construction of railings and stairwells. However, the company's background in railings and stairwells gave the company the ability to manufacture a wide variety of products other than trailers. The year 2015 marked the company's 40th anniversary of boat trailer manufacturing.
On January 1st, 2014, the sons of Lynn Kitchen, who had been managing the business for the past 38 years, split the ownership of several companies that they jointly owned, and Gary Kitchen(Lynn's second oldest living son) and his family became the new owners of Metal Craft, and changed the name to Metal Craft Manufacturing, LLC DBA (doing business as) Metal Craft Trailers.
Gary Kitchen - Owner and Manager
Gary currently manages Metal Craft. He started out sweeping the floors as a young teenager, and began welding and other shop work at the age of sixteen. In his early twenties, he became the shop's foreman, managing the work flow and filling in wherever he was needed for several years. Later on, he became the main bookkeeper for the company. Gary knows the ins and outs of this company and the trailer manufacturing business, as he has done nearly every job at the shop at one time or another. He continues to do the majority of the bookkeeping and background work of the company, working to improve the company wherever possible, leaving most of the day to day business to his trusted, able friends and managers, Allan "Kip" Winward and Andy Atkinson.
Gary's vision of the future includes making the world's best trailers and products as economically and efficiently as possible. Gary is pleased to say, without reservation, that the people at Metal Craft Manufacturing have a strong work ethic and integrity, which he feels is the key to their success, along with making sure that all customers are satisfied to the best of their ability.