The second factory
Noor Haddad, co-founder of Kestrel Heat, on building heat pumps in Toledo, Ohio, and keeping most of the company.
Show notes
Noor Haddad builds heat pumps in Toledo. Her first production line shut down in eight weeks. The second one makes money, and she still owns sixty percent of the company. We talk about why Toledo already knew how to bend copper, the eight weeks the first line ran, what a certified welder is worth, and the equipment loans that kept the cap table boring.
Sponsor: Ledgerline, read by Mara at 31:00 and disclosed in the audio. First month free with the code TABLE. All listener deals
Mentioned in this episode
- Kestrel Heat's installer map, Ohio and Michigan
- The U.S. Department of Energy's cold-climate heat pump specification
- American Welding Society certification, the D1.1 structural code
- Episode 119, Pricing the first hundred, with Theo Marsh
Transcript
0:00 Cold open
Noor We built the first factory to prove we could build a heat pump. We built the second one to prove we could make money building them.
Mara This is The Long Table. I'm Mara Lind. Noor Haddad is the co-founder of Kestrel Heat, and she has now built two factories in Toledo, Ohio.
3:40 Why heat pumps, why Toledo
Mara Most people hear heat pump and picture a box behind a house in Florida. Why build them in Toledo?
Noor Because Toledo already knows how to bend copper. There were three hundred people within ten miles who had done it for thirty years, and most of them had been laid off at least once.
Noor A heat pump is a refrigerator that runs backwards in winter. The physics is a hundred years old. The hard part is making one that works at minus ten and doesn't cost more than the furnace.
Mara And the price you were aiming for?
Noor Under nine thousand dollars installed for a three-bedroom house. The furnace it replaces is about seven.
18:15 The first line shut down in eight weeks
Noor The first line ran for eight weeks. Our brazing failure rate was eleven percent, and every failed unit cost about four hundred dollars to rework.
Noor We shut it down on a Thursday and told every customer the same afternoon. Nobody cancelled. Two people sent pizza.
Mara (sponsor read, disclosed in the audio) A short break. This episode is sponsored by Ledgerline, the bookkeeping service I've used for the show since 2024. Your first month is free with the code TABLE.
Noor The second line has a brazing failure rate under one percent. The difference wasn't the machines. It was who was standing next to them.
41:30 Paying welders more than engineers
Noor We pay a certified welder more than we paid our first software hire. People find that strange. I find it obvious. The welder is the product.
Mara How do you hire for that when every manufacturer in Ohio wants the same people?
Noor We pay for the certification, we pay during training, and we put the schedule on the wall a month ahead. Nobody in manufacturing does the last one, and it's the one people mention.
63:05 Financing hardware without selling the company
Noor Equipment loans are boring, and they're the reason we still own sixty percent of the company.
Noor Venture money is expensive in a factory. Every machine you buy with equity, you buy again every time you raise.
Mara Before the bonus, where can people buy one?
Noor We sell through about forty installers in Ohio and Michigan. The map is on our site.
82:10 Bonus: the term sheet she turned down
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Noor The term sheet was for forty million dollars, and it came with a board seat that could replace me in year two.
Noor I said no on a Friday and spent the weekend wondering if I'd just killed the company.
Mara What did Monday look like?
Noor Monday I called the bank about the second equipment loan. They said yes on Wednesday.
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About the guest
Noor Haddad co-founded Kestrel Heat in 2021 with a former Owens Corning engineer. The company employs 84 people across two production lines in Toledo and sells through about forty installers in Ohio and Michigan.
Recorded on Union Street in Brooklyn on September 22, 2026. Produced by Desmond Hale. Transcript checked by a person against the audio.