80 Years of Building
Things That Work
We’re a two-person shop in Newberg, Oregon. Every machine we ship was built by hand, here, by us. That’s not a marketing line — it’s just how we operate.
The Roots
It didn’t start with pets.
Prima’s story begins in the 1940s as an industrial pump and supply company. Through the following decades it split, evolved, and diversified — pressure washers, agricultural sprayers — always driven by the same principle: build equipment that holds up under real working conditions.
In the early 1980s, founder Gary Falkenberg launched the Spotlyte brand out of that same lineage. By the early 2000s, Spotlyte had developed what would become Prima’s signature product: professional pet bathing systems built specifically for working groomers who need equipment that keeps up with them.
For over twenty years, Prima machines earned a reputation in grooming shops across the country. Reliable. Repairable. Made to last.
Today
Carrying it forward.
In 2021, Paul Schildan — known to most as Schilly — took over Prima following a change in ownership. He came in not as a groomer, but as someone who’d spent years in software systems for small manufacturing — and saw immediately what made Prima worth preserving.
The craftsmanship was real. The customer loyalty was real. The product genuinely made groomers’ lives easier. What it needed was someone willing to invest in it, modernize it, and take it seriously again.
So he bought it. Prima is now a two-person, family-owned operation. Every machine is hand-assembled in our Newberg shop — small batch, built to order. When you call us, you get us.
How we operate
Hand-assembled.
Every one.
No production line. No overseas factory. Each machine is built by hand in Newberg, Oregon before it ships to you.
Small batch.
On purpose.
We build to order, not to inventory. That means every machine gets the attention it deserves — and you’re not getting something that’s been sitting in a warehouse.
Two people.
Real support.
When you reach out, you’re talking to the people who built your machine. Not a call center. Not a ticket system. Us.
See what we build.
Professional bathing systems, hand-assembled in Newberg, Oregon since 2000.