Modern Machine Shop magazine’s annual Top Shops Benchmarking Program shines a spotlight on the practices and performance metrics that separate high-performing machine shops from the rest of the field.

The top-performing manufacturers are celebrated at the magazine’s Top Shops Conference—a two-day event where small- and medium-sized manufacturers come together to get ideas and strategies from these shops and interact with toolmakers from around the country.

In 2025, one of those toolmakers was Accupro—part of MSC Industrial Supply’s Exclusive Brands—which was the Diamond Sponsor for the conference held November 11-12 at the NASCAR Hall of Fame in Charlotte, North Carolina.

“Sponsoring the Top Shops event was a great opportunity for us to interact with some of the top manufacturing shops in the country and let people know that we’re not just a house brand of MSC. We’re a real powerhouse when it comes to high-performance tooling,” says Byron Rodger, senior category manager for MSC’s Exclusive Brands.

A Perfect Fit for the Accupro Brand

Kelly Powell, marketing manager for MSC’s Exclusive Brands, says Accupro’s sponsorship of Top Shops 2025 was also ideal because of the type of shops that attend the conference.

“Top Shops is geared toward small- and medium-sized shops focused on productivity and cost management. Accupro fits seamlessly by offering a lower selling price than many competitors—without compromising quality,” Powell says.

She adds that many manufacturers they met were already familiar with the Accupro brand. “I was pleasantly surprised at how many shops knew Accupro, and that some didn’t realize that it’s a private brand for MSC. That shows us that people are starting to think of it as a big name-brand supplier rather than just a private brand.”

The Value of Face-to-Face Feedback

For Rodger, one of the biggest benefits of being at Top Shops 2025 was being able to talk to customers in person about their experiences with Accupro products.

“We got some really good feedback around tools that they’ve had successes with, as well as tools that they maybe had some issues with in the past, and we were able to have very candid discussions around what didn’t work and why,” Rodger says.

“All feedback is good feedback, whether it’s good, bad or ugly,” he adds.

Longtime MSC metalworking specialist Steve Turner was also there to talk to manufacturers. “Steve was able to help connect some dots and say, ‘You may have had issues in the past. Here’s the guy in your market who can help resolve some of these issues,’” Rodger says.

A Showcase for New Accupro Tools

Hearing feedback from manufacturers also gave Rodger the opportunity to promote new and improved tools from Accupro.

“I was able to say, ‘This tool might not have worked for you in the past, but we now have a new tool that has these additional features that would help solve those issues you were having with the previous version of the tool,’” he says.

For example, Rodger talked to conference attendees about a six-flute tool in Accupro’s carbide end mill line that was launched in May 2025. “This is a unique tool for us because we went a little above and beyond and used a higher-grade carbide than we use in our other tools,” Rodger says. It’s also available with or without a chip breaker, depending on what applications a manufacturer wants to use it for.

“Being able to have an in-person conversation with a shop about a new product that would help solve a real problem is something that Kelly and I don’t usually get the opportunity to do,” he says.

Opportunities to Expand Portfolio

Another benefit of being at Top Shops and talking to manufacturers, Rodger says, was that it opened their eyes to new possibilities for expanding their product line with variations of their existing tools.

“The majority of our Accupro line is standard tooling that’s in stock all the time, but we also have a lot of opportunities to do minor modifications of tools for a specific customer,” he says. “Once we create that tool, we may find that there are at least 10 other customers with a similar application that can use that same tool. This gives us an avenue for further expansion within our portfolio that we may not have had access to.”

For example, there were a few shops that asked Rodger if a particular tool was available with a chip splitter on it. “I said, ‘Let me work with my manufacturer. I can get some samples created for you to run some tests, and if it’s something that you want, we’ll add it to the standard portfolio to service your needs first and then open it up for the rest of our customers,’” he says.

“These kinds of interactions with shops really help us see the landscape of new innovations that shops are trying and what they’re looking for,” Powell adds. “This way, we can start finding the correct suppliers to source from and make sure that we’re out in the marketplace with new products, just like everybody else.”

Ultimately, Rodger says the biggest benefit of sponsoring Top Shops is that it helped Accupro step out of its traditional marketing and promotion efforts and reach customers in a different way.

“We were able to increase our footprint and the amount of touches we have with existing, former and potentially new customers,” he says.

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