Company History

Century Plating is a family owned business. John G. Koltse, one of Century Plating’s original founders, started the business in 1948 with one polishing lathe. Because of his natural engineering abilities, dedication and innovative nature he was able to build and grow a successful plating company. In 1953 the company expanded and built a new facility at the current Oakley Avenue location in Chicago. The company offered many different finishes, but began specializing in Nickel–Chrome plating on steel parts in the mid 1960’s.

In 1968 the company added additional production space. A fully automatic plating line was installed. This equipment specialized in Duplex–Nickel Chrome plating on steel parts for outdoor automotive as well as indoor specifications. Many of the features of the new automatic plating line included significant innovations found only at Century Plating. In 1980 the plating line was expanded to include Microporous Chrome plating. Also during this time, semi-automatic polishing machines designed and built by Century Plating were added to the polishing capabilities of the company.

During the early 1970’s the second generation of owners started working at Century Plating. George Koltse began in 1973 with a BS degree in Physics and a MS degree in Nuclear Engineering. George applied his knowledge of formal engineering principles to the operations of the company. In 1976 Victor LaPorta joined the company with important purchasing skills as well as the skills needed to build and maintain plating equipment. Vic’s commitment to excellence significantly helped Century in achieving high quality finishes without production interruptions. Both embraced the Century culture established by John Koltse of producing high quality finishes, on time and at competitive prices. They also understood the importance of innovating to achieve greater success. These practices were formalized in 2002 when the company became ISO 9001 certified.

In 2001 the company expanded again by adding 20,000 square feet of production space and a second automatic plating line dedicated to Duplex Nickel, Tri-Ni – Microporous Chrome plating on steel parts. All of the innovations developed in the past were incorporated into the new line including patented filtration methods and patented plating rack designs.

Today the third generation of family members is involved at Century Plating with the goal of continuing to provide our customers with high quality finishes, produced on time and at competitive prices.