Editorial Advisory Board 2023-2026: Meet New Board Member Justin Jagels

Meet Justin Jagels. Justin is the owner and president of mold design and engineering firm J Squared Design Services LLC based in Arkansas City, Kansas. Justin founded J Squared Design Services to help companies fight engineering bottlenecks with high-quality engineering solutions that exceed expectations. With more than 10 years of individual design experience, plus decades of experience to draw from in his network of designers, his firm stands ready to serve a customer’s engineering needs.

Justin designs parts, molds, tools and fixtures as specified by the customer. He also manages the company’s business functions, including sales and marketing, payroll, customer management and service.

“With the understanding that lead time is second only to quality, Justin is committed to minimizing the time a job will spend in engineering backlog and maximizing the time a shop has to build tooling. He understands that in addition to quality engineering, a level of company culture goes into each design. It may not appear important to everyone, but he understands that “how we do things” is integral to staying competitive in the marketplace. So, he strives to ensure his designs match a high engineering standard and the company culture.

In addition to Justin, he employs two part-time “in-training” engineers and a few part-time contractors who fill in as demand requires. He plans to expand his workforce and turn his part-time staff into full-time employees by 2025.

Justin earned his Bachelor’s of Science degree in plastics engineering technology with a design emphasis and mathematics minor from Pittsburg State University in Pittsburg, Kansas. He has 11 years of experience designing molds/tools for the plastics and aerospace industry in Creo Parametric and CATIA V5. This work includes injection molds (from prototype to Class 101, no specified industry), blow molds (large part, ductwork, etc.), compression molds (various heating methods, mainly thermoset) and composite layup molds. Justin has also been involved in injection, blow and rotomolded part design.

When it comes to mold design, most of what he learned has been from his time with mold builders and machinists on the shop floor and not from other engineers. He leaned heavily on them for guidance, critical mold design best practices to streamline manufacturing and vital mold maintenance and repair considerations. Justin continues to learn by seeking feedback from customers.

He sits on the Society of Plastics Engineers (SPE) Plastics Advisory Council at Pittsburg State University, which engages with the university to direct the curricula. He is also on a mission to launch a not-for-profit apprenticeship organization to focus on building apprenticeship programs in mold building companies.

While serving on the board, Justin plans to contribute insight and feedback on mold and tooling design, software, culture, shop floor/process/workflow, mold materials, mold components, training, workforce development and global competition.

During his term, Justin hopes to explore the industry further, meet people with a greater perspective and knowledge base and help expand the industry’s outreach to the younger generation.

Justin’s hobbies include work and family. He has tried to develop other hobbies that would fill his time, but nothing holds his interest like the plastics industry does — he can’t get enough of the different processes and learning opportunities to expand his skill set.

Justin is married to an obstetric (OB) nurse and has three children with whom he loves to spend time with when he is not working. He and his wife have a plastics product they hope to launch this year to train OB nurses.