History of AtLasta Specialty Ink
Charles H. Harrison, Ph. D. was working with a company which had many shortcomings. He saw a need for greater CUSTOMER SATISFACTION AND SERVICE in a specialty ink manufacturing company. He recognized also a need for greater employee satisfaction and involvement in the production effort. He resigned his Department Head status with that company and set out to develop a company which would offer GREATER CUSTOMER SATISFACTION, GREATER CUSTOMER SERVICE AND MAJOR INVOLVEMENT OF THE EMPLOYEES.
As a Quality Control Chemist in both education and past work experience, maintenance of tight quality control standards was set down as the basic corner stone for the manufacturing activity.
Background
The first major development, an oil-water emulsion fforescent ink, was accomplished in Charles' garage.
Followed by the acceptance from the US Postal Service, this red ink became the water based Postage Meter Ink now known internationally.
A second major break through come when hog tattoo paste was developed. This paste was the first to be made thick enough to apply, strong enough color, and yet not contain the prohibited substance, Carbon Black. Several such inks for stamping and branding have been formulated and accepted by the U S Dept. of Agriculture.
These products were offered to various distributors and dealers and AtLasta Specialty Ink Company, Inc. was formed.
In the spring of 1987, AtLasta Specialty Ink Company, Inc. rented it's first manufacturing site from a local printing company, it was a a concrete two-car garage at 5632 Telegraph Road in Saint Louis Mo. That site is now occupied by a Dierbergs Food Store & Shopping Center. Jerry Goff and Charles watched as many houses were demolished to make land available for this Center. "We were forced to move as the bulldozers were pushing at our door." The second manufacturing site for was found in Cedar Hill, Jefferson Co. We shared a very cold metal building with a machine shop, and not too friendly owner. The remanufacturing of toner cartridges began here.
In September of 1989, the company rented a 2400 sq. ft. building in High Ridge, MO. We soon outgrew it. 4600 South Square Dr. became available in December of 1991 and Charles quickly purchased it. The 5000 sq foot building is still home to AtLasta today. Soon after, the Harrison's purchased National Laser Cartridge Company. With this new edition, continual growth, additional employees , laser printers, copy machines and many inkjet printers led to an increase of business by more than 30%.
The Toner & Ink Jet Service used more than 2 dozen different laser printers, eight different copy machines and more than fifteen different ink jet printers from four different manufacturers to test recycled products. National Laser used several cartridge cleaning and filling machines to keep up with demand. Our customers received a thoroughly tested product, that was guaranteed with confidence. We continued to keep quality control the utmost of importance proving to make us different from other ink manufacturers.
The Toner Service with a local storefront, serviced well over 500 customers in the St. Louis area and surrounding 48 states. In December 2023, upon the retirement of Sue Ellen Harrison, National Laser Cartridge closed.
In 1987 we we’re not even able to pay anyone a salary. Since that time AtLasta Specialty Ink Company, Inc. has grown steadily. By 2000, AtLasta was producing and selling over 3000 pounds of Postage Meter Ink, and 300 gallons of Tattoo Paste a month. Our five different Postage Meter Rollers were sold in Europe and Canada. The Postal Service switched to using digital markings so our focus shifted to the manufacture of marking, stamping, stenciling and branding inks for the food industry.
Today Atlasta manufactures
In the summer of 1999, the TherMark Corporation, while searching the internet for a specialty ink company, found AtLasta. Since then we created a joint venture to research, discover and invent laser marking materials which reacts with low power laser light and creates a surface enhancement of ceramic nature, leaving computer generated characters, designs and markings on most all materials including steel, aluminum, glass, and ceramics. We continue our collaboration with Laser Bondi Technology (formerly TherMark) today. We currently use our 5000 watt CO2 laser and Jaag Laser to mark UID tags, awards and plaques, cups and a multitude of other products.