Site Weld, based in Willis St, manufactures products for industries including road transport, mining support and general engineering.
It has operated since 2012 and employs 50 staff.
General manager Stephanie Olsen said the trading environment had been really tough for at least the past two years.
Services, repairs and general engineering was a hard game at the best of times.
‘‘When the economy goes flat, engineering is the first thing to go flat,’’ Mrs Olsen said.
‘‘We have to be able to offer up some other products and things to be able to balance out that, so that we’re not caught.’’
To combat the highs and lows of the industry, Site Weld had branched out and Mrs Olsen estimated 10%-15% of their total product output was now being exported.
The company introduced its Enex brand of products upon realising there was an opportunity to market globally.
This year, it secured a distributor in Mexico for its Enex Eco Loo — a toilet system which can connect to mine air, water and power supply — and is being trialled in at least three different mines.
Site Weld is also in conversations with the West African mining sector.
New Zealand benefited from exports and the products Site Weld was exporting were ‘‘significant-valued products’’, Mrs Olsen said.
‘‘We do believe that the economy is on the shift; you can feel it.
‘‘Our customers are freeing up with their spend and their confidence, which means in turn we are too.’’
Within the past month or two in particular, it had felt like their industry had turned a corner, she said.
‘‘I think it can only go up from here, which is really positive for our sector.’’
Technical manager Adrian Olsen said mining could be considered a contentious topic by some.
‘‘But what we’re trying to do is change the way of mining,’’ Mr Olsen said.
‘‘We’re building recyclable, renewable infrastructure products that can be reused over and over and over again.’’
They aimed to make their underground mining toilet facilities out of 93%-94% recyclable materials.
Site Weld was also exporting underground refuge chambers — a clean air environment for miners in the event of an incident — to Australia.
They were the only manufacturers of underground refuge chambers in the country, Mr Olsen said.
He believed there were no other companies in Dunedin that shared Site Weld’s approach to developing mining products.
‘‘It’s about understanding how mining operations work and how can we put a spin on it that allows mining companies to actually be able to say ‘well, actually, we are not this big dirty thing’ that people perceive them to be.’’
