Vermeer Corporation's Plant 1 in Pella grew out of the company's earlier west-side "Old Plant 1," first built in 1955, after that small shop no longer had enough room for founder Gary Vermeer's innovations. The current Plant 1 facility and the Corporate Office were constructed in 1968 on what became the Vermeer Mile, a mile-long campus in Pella. In its early years, Plant 1 produced a wide range of equipment including balers, small tree spades, rubber-tired trenchers, and small track machines. Today, it builds a variety of machines but is especially known for manufacturing legacy parts for older equipment and specialty tooling for horizontal directional drilling and environmental products, totaling more than 5,000 unique parts. Plant 1 also serves as the company's weld training facility, where every welder on the shop floor is trained and team members can earn new welding certifications or learn how to weld. The plant also houses the metallurgy lab, where welding robots are tested before production use and the quality of steel used to build equipment is analyzed.