Safety zone

Safety products distributor Safety Today understands that its efforts can make a difference in the lives of employees and the bottom lines of employers.

by Richard Vurva

The day started like any other at an asphalt plant in Denver. A tanker truck carrying hot, 400 F asphalt rolled through the gates and waited for a plant employee to gather a test sample. The employee donned his protective gloves to guard against the heat and turned the valve to release the sample. Nothing happened. He turned the valve a second time. Again, nothing.

Suddenly, the valve blew, spewing hot asphalt everywhere. The gloves protected his hands and forearms, but some of the boiling liquid dripped over the top of the gloves, causing first- and second-degree burns to the employee’s arms. Fellow workers immediately came to his aid, making sure he received needed medical attention.

Not long after the accident happened, plant management took steps to make sure no other employees in that plant or others like it around the country would face similar pain and suffering. The company asked its safety products supplier, Safety Today, to perform a comprehensive plant safety audit.

Safety Today recommended that workers wear a full-sleeve protective leather glove that fits snugly over their entire arm. The Safety Today team also looked for other potential safety hazards throughout the plant.

“We spent three days onsite analyzing ‘what-if’ scenarios. What if this valve breaks? What happens to the employee?” says Mark Micheles, vice president of national accounts and field operations. The objective was to help create a safer work environment.

Conducting safety audits is just one way this safety distributor benefits customers. Working closely with a customer’s purchasing, health and safety, or environmental departments, Safety Today also helps companies standardize personal protective equipment (PPE) product purchases to lower costs.

Safety 24/7
With seven branches in the U.S. and Canada and a 95,000-square-foot headquarters facility near Columbus in Groveport, Ohio, Safety Today has annual sales of about $32 million. Formerly known as Twyman-Templeton until being acquired by Volk Enterprises in 1999, the company takes pride in its ability to help customers create safer work settings.

“We’ve honed our focus in the last couple of years on multi-location corporate accounts that are looking for a coordinated, focused safety program provided by a capable, full-service distributor,” says Ted Cowie, executive vice president and chief operating officer.

Although some companies turn to general-line distributors and catalogs to acquire low-priced safety products, Cowie believes many customers still understand the value that a specialty safety distributor provides.

“A buyer focused just on the cost of the PPE is looking at only a small part of the equation,” says Andrew Mitchell, vice president of operations and marketing. “We’re trying to move the pendulum by saying we can be competitive on your PPE pricing, but what we want to do is cut down the total cost for keeping your employees safe.”

The approach works well with major clients, including Toyota Motor Manufacturing, which awarded Safety Today with its coveted Gold and Silver supplier awards in 2001 and 2002, and Owens Corning, the multi-billion dollar global manufacturer of home building products.

John Becker, global MRO leader for Owens Corning’s worldwide sourcing activities, says the company expects competitive pricing from its supply base, but it’s equally important to offer value-added services that can drive productivity cost savings.

“We believe the value in having a supplier relationship is not necessarily in the price, but in the guarantee that they can bring us improved performance through productivity, through cost savings, consignment, vendor management and the myriad of programs available,” says Becker.

He says strong supplier relationships require working with all levels of the company’s plants.

“Safety Today has an ongoing relationship with both parts of our business, the safety professional and our MRO buyer. We don’t have to spend a lot of time quibbling about the price of an item. We spend a lot more time discussing how we can jointly develop opportunities for improving our bottom line. That’s the benefit of having a company like Safety Today,” he says.

“We have to keep purchasing and safety happy. That’s always a fine line. If we can get those two parties together and walk that fine line, that’s when we make big inroads,” Klemish says.

At several Owens Corning locations, vending units placed near work sites, break rooms or locker facilities grant workers easy access to safety glasses, respirators, gloves and other PPE products.

Becker expects the units to lower Owens Corning’s PPE costs by as much as 30 percent. Since the vending machines track usage by employees, he says workers take only those products they need. Plus, by standardizing on a select few products, the system also lowers inventory costs.

If a company wants to have a limited number of gloves or hearing protection or clothing, that’s all it puts into the vending machines.

Owens Cornings went from 213 different PPE items to 23, saving more than $250,000 a year, says Dan Dimas, director of safety services. Nearly half of that savings was a direct result of the vending program.

“If you don’t standardize, you won’t be able to supply the vending machines. You’ll have too many varieties,” he says.

Vending machines provide companies with more control, enabling them to track who checked out the safety equipment and compare PPE usage between employees or departments.

“Safety Today gives us utilization reports that tell us how many each individual has used,” says Dimas. “If there’s an overuse problem, the employee’s supervisor will ask why he’s using so much more than everyone else. If there’s a legitimate reason, end of discussion. If there’s not a legitimate reason, they’re coached on the proper use of the equipment.”

In some cases, Owens Corning discovered that some employees were throwing away ear protection every day, even though they were reusable. That prompted the company to convert to using more disposable hearing protection.

“One customer had a situation where an employee cut his hand and sued the company, claiming they didn’t provide the proper equipment,” says Robert Cowling, sales manager for Safety Today’s Brantford, Ontario, branch. “Checking the records, we found that just the day before, he dispensed a pair of cut-resistant gloves. The workers compensation claim was thrown out.”

Some distributors are reluctant to introduce vending machines into customer locations because they may ultimately reduce the number of products the distributor sells, acknowledges Mark Micheles, vice president of national accounts and field operations. “But it also provides a value to our customer base. It’s providing an inventory storage solution and it drives significant savings,” he says. It also increases an employer’s control over employee use of personal protective gear.

“When ANSI came out with a new standard for eyewash, we e-mailed customers a summary of the new standards,” says Cowling. “That led into conducting eyewash surveys with several customers to determine if they were in compliance with the new standard. We then submitted a report recommending those products that would enable them to comply with the new ANSI standard.”

After uncovering an application where a different product might work more effectively, salespeople don’t automatically implement a product substitution, however.

“In our view, there’s a correct way and a wrong way to move people out of products they’re currently using,” says Micheles. For example, if a customer used a certain glove, in the past a distributor salesperson might have suggested substituting an imported knock-off glove and switch it out without changing the pricing.

“It was a way for a distributor to improve their margin,” Micheles says. “We take a more deliberate approach. We go to great lengths to match up specifically what that customer is using and then make recommendations. There’s a testing and evaluation process that goes with that. We don’t just switch something out. When we do make a change, we document it.”

Another large customer facility used nearly 20 different types of hand protection. After performing a comprehensive risk assessment and PPE survey, Safety Today recommended that the company could achieve the hand protection it needed by standardizing on four types of gloves.

“Before changing the gloves, however, we formed a glove committee that consisted of a line worker, safety department employees and a buyer,” says Micheles.

The committee told employees to keep using their existing glove until it wore out. When it needed to be replaced, they moved to the replacement glove until it wore out, and then went back to the original product. The process, which includes documented employee evaluations, allowed employees to make a fair comparison between the two products and involved the team in the ultimate decision to change.

In the end, even though the new gloves cost about $2 more per dozen, the change resulted in saving the plant about $180,000 because the replacement glove lasted nearly six times longer.

“They eliminated a lot of SKUs in their stockroom. We eliminated a lot of additional inventory we didn’t have to carry for that plant. We incurred zero injuries from that point on. Overall, it was a huge success,” says Micheles.

“They have to be documented and signed off by customers. We’re experimenting with it this year to see how it drives behavior. We may find a way to tie it into everyone’s compensation next year,” says Cowie.

The company also requires sales reps to provide regular call reports to the key constituents at the customer. The reports summarize activities they’ve performed, problems they’ve solved, plans for upcoming training sessions and other activities.

“By having that kind of communication discipline, it makes it a lot easier for the customer to recognize that we’re doing a lot more than providing them with products. We’re striving to make their work environment safer and more productive,” says Cowie. “The more we require sales reps to communicate with customers in those terms, the more they’ll develop a relationship that goes beyond a traditional buyer/seller relationship.”

Ask any distributor to describe their primary job and you’ll hear a variety of responses. Some say they’re a low-cost provider of products. Others tout their value-added services. Some take pride in helping customers lower their procurement costs and making productivity improvements. At Safety Today, employees describe their role in much grander terms.

This article originally appeared in the July/August 2003 issue of Progressive Distributor. Copyright 2003.