Jim Browning ordered a new Corvette in January 1997, but not as a successful aging executive in the throes of a midlife crisis struggling to hang on to the remnants of his youth and vitality. Browning-owner of Corsa Performance-wanted something else from the newly redesigned high-performance vehicle. He planned to profit from it.
When the car arrived in April, Corsa had already developed new muffler tips for its tail pipe, the ones that give the Corvette’s bold, flashy exterior its finishing touch. But those external accessories were only the beginning. Next, Corsa engineers redesigned the Corvette’s exhaust system.
Chevrolet executives liked Corsa’s design so much they lent the company its own engineers to help modify and install it on the 1998 Indianapolis 500 pace car. In the following months, Corsa’s Corvette exhaust system was featured in nearly every high performance car magazine in the world. Car dealerships, high performance shops and individual Corvette owners inundated the Berea manufacturer with requests for the new products.
What makes this story unusual is that in 1997, Corsa didn’t need new products; the company was doing just fine with its existing core line.
If you own a boat, odds are that Corsa made the exhaust system. In fact, the company supplies more than 60 original equipment U.S. boat manufacturers with products and owns a 90 percent share of the marine industry’s high performance exhaust market. Annual revenue exceeds $5 million.
Corsa leveraged its exhaust systems expertise to develop and add automotive systems to its manufacturing line without losing focus on its core business. Here’s how.
Be willing to diversify
Corsa’s bread and butter is stainless steel exhaust systems for boats. Browning owns two patents on muffler designs, which increase airflow and reduce sound. But, says Tom Miller, Corsa’s marketing director, the company wanted to end its nine-year dependence on the seasonal marine industry. Explains Browning, “The marine industry is dependent on discretionary income. It’s the first to dive when the economy goes down.”
During the past nine years, Corsa has been eager to help manufacturers and boat dealers develop specialty marine exhaust products, and in the process, expand the company’s capabilities, Miller says. Recently, Corsa developed a titanium exhaust system for a British manufacturer to install on its new line of all-aluminum boats for use by the Hong Kong police, who patrol the harbors.
“Our exhaust system helped make the boat 300 pounds lighter,” Miller says.
Use what you know
To say that Browning is something of a motorhead would be an understatement. He boasts a collection of Hot Rod magazine dating back to the 1950s; has owned several earlier versions of the Corvette; and built three boats from scratch. Before he founded Corsa in 1989 with his sons, Tom and Jim Jr., Browning spent 17 years at Mr. Gasket Co., a high-performance auto parts maker. When he left Mr. Gasket, he was vice president of research and development.
It was just a matter of time before Browning’s interests, expertise and experience intersected and Corsa entered the automotive products industry.
Even with experience, the phase-in didn’t happen overnight. Because Corsa engineers were working with different temperatures and new metals, including titanium, they had to learn different processes.
“Since this was a brand new technology, it took a little time,” says Browning. “It was four months before we had the exhaust system in production. Now, however, we could alter the technology for other vehicles in two weeks.”
Don’t be afraid to
bring in experts
Browning’s extensive background notwithstanding, the idea for redesigning the Corvette exhaust system was far more complex than he or Corsa’s other full-time engineers could handle alone. So Browning brought in a retired NASA acoustic engineer to help develop the new technology, called reflective sound-cancellation muffler technology.
RSC essentially eliminates engine noise from the Corvette’s interior and improves air flow by 45 percent. That, says Browning, creates more power for the Corvette’s engine-a full seven horsepower more than the factory exhaust system provided.
“It’s a combination of very high air flow without interior cabin resonance,” he says. “And it’s a technology we can apply to other vehicles, such as lawn mowers and highway tractor trailers.”
Browning says the collaboration with outside engineers has worked so well that Corsa plans to continue with them on future projects.
Don’t forget about
your core business
When Corsa’s engineers started on the Corvette muffler tips and exhaust systems, they didn’t drain Corsa’s existing resources. Instead, Browning expanded the company’s manufacturing facilities and divided the workload into two divisions-marine systems and Corvette systems. Each is housed in separate sides of Corsa’s building.
Explains Jim Jr., Corsa’s sales manager, “We expanded our employee base to 58 full-time people to handle the extra work. Now we’re planning on building a new facility so we can better house them.”
To that end, Corsa is constructing a new 30,000 square-foot building on four acres with the capacity to expand to 100,000 square feet. Explains Browning, “We’ve already got the customers. Now we just have to look at the different applications of what we have and develop more new products. There are a lot of good opportunities in the marine industry that we still haven’t tapped.”
