We hope you had a wonderful holiday season with family and friends. From all of us at IMTS, we wish you health, happiness, and prosperity in 2026. The start of an IMTS show year is a natural time to set new goals and define what success looks like in the year ahead. With IMTS 2026 taking place September 14-19 at Chicago’s McCormick Place, here are three ideas to help guide that thinking: Establish bold goalsProgress begins with clarity. Setting bold goals creates direction and momentum, pushing organizations beyond incremental improvements and toward what’s truly possible. Growth follows when people, processes, and technology come together in new ways. IMTS helps manufacturers step outside of their day-to-day routines by immersing themselves in innovations that turn ambitious ideas into practical plans. Atlas Fibre integrated their machining centers with a Fastems (IMTS booth #338966) FMS pallet handling system, enabling up to 72 hours of unattended operation. Ensure your foundation supports those goalsEvery shop and organization has processes, technologies, and long-standing practices that have served them well. As priorities evolve and expectations change, some approaches may need updating. Aging equipment, manual operations, and disconnected systems can make it harder to capture new opportunities. The new year presents an opportunity to take a fresh look at where thoughtful enhancements can unlock greater efficiency, flexibility, and long-term value. Establish production improvementsYour people are already working hard. The next step is making sure they have the tools and capacity to generate greater impact per person, a hallmark of top-performing shops. Look for areas where production could be increased if constraints were addressed and then focus on removing those bottlenecks. Exploring the exhibitors and solutions at IMTS 2026 is a strong place to start. For inspiration on how these ideas come together in real-world settings, explore stories from the IMTS community. Here are just a few examples: A 10-person shop established a roadmap to digital transformation and now competes successfully with overseas companies. A composites fabricator grew revenue 500% in five years while keeping headcount lean. Adding a 4K digital measuring microscope helped an 18-person CNC shop win a new customer. A job shop owner describes how IMTS helped him “redefine our trajectory” by adding machines that boosted income by $1 million and cut cycle time on one part from 10 hours to 20 minutes! We look forward to welcoming you to IMTS 2026 and inspiring you to achieve great things this year. Start preparing now. Register for IMTS 2026 and explore more exhibitors and features at IMTS.com.
An IMTS show year is the perfect time to set bold goals, strengthen your foundation, and remove production bottlenecks — turning ambition into action with ideas, solutions, and inspiration found at IMTS 2026.
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