Bowie International: Manufacturing Ways to Bring the Vet to the Animals

For a manufacturer to stay in operation for a lengthy period in its original location, it has to make a good product while maintaining the flexibility to change as the market dictates. Bowie International has done that, strengthening its position as the oldest mobile veterinary clinic manufacturer in the country from its location in Lake City, IA, since its inception more than 50 years ago.

The mobile clinics are more sophisticated than in the past due to innovations in design and technology by automobile manufacturers.  Bowie does an excellent job of keeping up with the changes and developing new designs to work effectively with a broad range of vehicles.

Continuous innovation

Founded by Dr. M.C. Bowie in Lake City in 1960, Bowie International manufactures fiberglass mobile veterinary clinics that provide veterinarians the ability to bring medicine, medical tools, water, lights, and electricity to customers with animals for which transportation is too costly or complicated. Its first model was a truck chassis-mounted fiberglass mobile veterinary clinic, but it expanded its product line in 1969 with a MINI slip-in to fit inside truck beds. The company has displayed remarkable foresight and flexibility over the years. Today, it produces 14 models, encompassing chassis-mounted, insert and slide-in mobile vet clinics. The design concepts work with basically every truck bed design, SUVs, vans and minivans. It also provides portable veterinary X-ray generators and accessories. 

Bowie was acquired by McLaughlin Family Companies, manufacturer of New Way® refuse trucks, in 2007, and the company added another mobile veterinary clinic manufacturer, Porta-Vet, to its production capabilities in 2008. 

Connection to veterinarian needs

While Bowie has transformed over the years into a genuine international manufacturing company, with customers stretching from North America to Asia and Australia, maintaining close ties to the needs of veterinary professionals is the underlying theme of its success. Students from approximately 30 veterinary schools nationwide use Bowie’s products and provide critical feedback to the company for future developments. Staff attend national equine and veterinary shows to display their products. The sales force remains in direct contact with clients, providing installation assistance and any troubleshooting needed. Many customers are in more rural communities due to the prevalence of greater concentrations of large animal populations. But they do have some clients who are equine doctors at race tracks in large metropolitan areas. 

Lake City is home

With wonderful, small-town quality of living and the presence of highly-talented employees in and around Lake City, Bowie has remained on the same site where the company began, with several additions increasing its footprint to about 65,000 square feet.

Bowie International is just one dynamic manufacturing company succeeding in Western Iowa's favorable economic climate. Learn about it and others produce and market their goods and services nationally and internationally with business-friendly state policies and the region's highly trained and productive workforce at Western Iowa Advantage.