RAMM Metalworks: Stay-at-home dad finds his Creative Spark

As a child, Ron Gosselin loved to draw. When he got older, he loved to tinker with things mechanical. Now, due to a few of life’s surprising curveballs, he gets to do both.

When he was laid off from his job in 2004, Ron and his wife Melanie decided he would become “Mr. Mom” so their daughters, Allison and Madison, who are now six and three, would have a stay-at-home parent for a few years. The layoff actually came at a good time, according to Gosselin. “It coincided with the end of Melanie’s second maternity leave.” Like many stay-at-home parents, Gosselin wanted a way to make extra money. “I started making things at night with a hand-held plasma cutter,” he says, explaining how he got started with metalworking. “It wasn’t long until I had to have a bigger one,” he laughs. “You know, men and their toys.”

These days, Gosselin works with a 4’ x 8’ computer-navigated- control plasma cutter. He assembled it right out of the box and then taught himself to run the machine as well as the graphics software he uses to create his designs. He has been in business for just over a year now, and things are “going very well.”

A walk through Gosselin’s yard is a walk through wonderland. A giant purple butterfly bench nestles into the foliage at the front of his house. An intricate wrought iron gate swings open to his backyard, where palm trees reach up to the sky. A dragonfly rests its wings under a leafy frond. Sunbursts enhance a wooden fence.

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Inside the shop, everything is orderly. Stacks of cut metal designs await the final step in the process – a coating of powder that gives Gosselin’s work its reputation for quality. “I’m one of the few metal artisans who offers this,” Gosselin explains. The powder coating, which provides the best protection from the elements, is blown on and baked in a 400-degree oven for over four hours. The end result? Each piece is wrapped in the kind of gorgeous glossy finish that is found mainly on high-end patio furniture.

For a relatively new business, Gosselin’s reputation has spread rapidly. “Spring, summer and fall is all about pilgrimages to art shows across Ontario,” Gosselin explains. He’ll sell a couple of hundred pieces at a show, but his favourite part of the job is to fill custom orders. “It’s a real sense of accomplishment when you give someone something they like,” he says. “I make my piece for your application. It’s not about how that piece would work at my home, it’s how you want it to look at yours.”

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This customer-focused approach has really paid dividends. As Gosselin says, “most of my clients are return customers. I have one customer in Barrie who already has four of my pieces. He recently called to pre-order four more pieces, which he was very involved in designing. I’ll deliver them to him when I’m at Kempenfest in August.

“I have one motto,” Gosselin says. “If you can think it, I can make it.”

RAMM Metalworks
1364 South Talbot Road, RR#1
Oldcastle
519.737.2694
www.rammmetalworks.com