Meet The Team – Brett

July 7, 2021

Kosmo Machine welcomes Brett Cherefko as its new Certified Weld Inspector (CWI).

With over three decades of welding experience in SMAW, GTAW, and FCAW disciplines, Brett has 19 years of CWI experience and is a member of the American Welding Society.

When asked why he decided to join Kosmo, Brett was his usual forthright self, saying :

The first time I visited Kosmo Machine I quickly realized they had something unique to offer. I was very impressed by the quality evident in the shop, the wide range of highly specialized equipment and the skills, ability, and attention to detail demonstrated by the employees.

Kosmo’s Heath Stewart, VP of Operations added :

We developed the Certified Weld Inspector position to take our welding department from first-class to world-class. CWI’s must undergo specialized training and certification, helping them understand the nuances of compliance within the code, and Brett was the perfect person to bring in to Kosmo. He has the training and the certification, coupled with extensive hands-on experience.

Asked a month or so after he’d started whether his initial impressions were correct, Brett added :

Absolutely! All my initial impressions, combined with our ISO 9001:2015 quality program means Kosmo has what it takes to make it right – the first time. Additionally, unlike many other machine shops, Kosmo has a welding division staffed with very talented welders. I knew this was a company I wanted to work for and where I could utilize my skills and experience as a CWI to produce superior products unmatched in the industry. It’s always good when perception aligns with reality.”

Established in 1976, Kosmo Machine Inc. has operated as a Virginia-based business devoted to quality production and superior customer service. Now an employee owned ESOP, their full-service precision machine shop specializes in CNC milling and turning, EDM machining, custom welding processes and critical component reconditioning.

Mike Redden, Kosmo Machine’s President has helped build a company where a reputation for quality and excellence goes hand-in-hand with a focus on staff and career development. Mike proudly stated:

At Kosmo, our well-trained personnel and modern technologies can turn the most challenging designs into reality. This has been made possible by continued investments in the latest technologies and recruiting top talent like Brett and his colleagues. Our history of 99.9% customer acceptance rates and our attention to even the smallest of detail has allowed us to build our business and attract motivated individuals who take pride and a personal responsibility for each job.

We’ll wrap this up by asking Brett his thoughts on some of the challenges facing the industry:

In my experience the industry has evolved over the years to the extent that welding has become an engineered science as well as an art. That transition coupled with requirements for close dimensional tolerances is creating challenges for many welding shops. Kosmo meets these challenges with its powerhouse of machining ability and superior skills, experience, and patience among the machinists and welders. This allows Kosmo to consistently produce technically unique components that other shops cannot.

Located near the Richmond International Airport, Kosmo’s 62,000-square-foot, climate-controlled facility in Sandston, Virginia, can handle the entire lifecycle of just about any precision project—from initial concept to large-scale production runs.