When it comes to teaching about metalworking fluids, Ashburn Chemical Technologies is a class act. Its efforts earned the company the 2003 Progressive Distributor Manufacturer Product Training Award.

by Richard Vurva

Ruben Delgadillo doesn’t believe in procrastination. The day after attending a training seminar on coolants, cutting fluids and other chemicals, he was on the road sharing his newfound product knowledge with customers and prospects. An outside salesman for Rex Supply in Houston, Delgadillo participated in a March training program by Houston-based Ashburn Chemical Technologies, formerly Ashburn Industries.

Delgadillo was so fired up, he asked one of the seminar presenters to accompany him the next day on joint sales calls to key accounts. They visited several companies to talk about products that could save them money and improve their processes. Some accepted test samples and others placed orders on the spot.

Even though he’s only been in sales for about 18 months, Delgadillo is on track to become one of Rex Supply’s top sellers of Ashburn products. Since attending the two-day training session, his sales have increased by more than 30 percent.

“I’ve been to several different training sessions from vendors. I found this one to be very inspiring and very educational,” says Delgadillo.

In recognition of its efforts to equip distributor salespeople with the knowledge they need to sell chemical products, Ashburn received the 2003 Progressive Distributor Manufacturer Product Training award. Previous award winners include Standard Abrasives, Milwaukee Electric and CooperTools.

The right mix
Ashburn’s training is effective because it’s geared toward providing practical advice to distributor salespeople, says company president Steve Madden.

“We focus 100 percent of our training on how to approach the end-user and the best way to sell our products,” says Madden. “If distributor salespeople can’t use the training information in their daily sales lives, then we don’t mention it.”

The company keeps its training sessions lively by injecting humor into the presentations, using multiple presenters who speak no more than 45 minutes each, and by providing plenty of case studies involving real customers.

Early in each training session, Ashburn gives salespeople “end-user lead sheets” for their use during the training. During product demonstrations or discussions about particular applications, presenters encourage class participants to write down the names of companies that might be prospects for that particular product.

“We want every person to leave the training with several end-user targets to approach,” Madden says.

John Martin is president of J.C. Tool Supply in Fort Worth, Texas, a cutting tools distributor with extensive experience in metalworking but limited knowledge about coolants and cutting fluid technology. He says Ashburn’s training helped him become more knowledgeable about chemicals.

“I learned a lot,” Martin says. “It easily could have become very technical, but they geared it to the class. Most of us had a working knowledge but by no means were experts in cutting fluids. It was tailored to our level and very user-friendly. They had a chemist in the training seminar who could answer technical questions by breaking them down into layman’s terms.”

Martin says discussions about how to sell Ashburn’s service program were especially useful. Through its subsidiary Fluid Service Technologies (FST), a service company that provides on-site fluid maintenance, Ashburn provides services ranging from machine cleaning and fluid sample analysis to complete on-site maintenance and management of a facility’s metalworking fluids.

“Many customers don’t want to deal with maintaining their coolants,” says Martin. “If they can find someone qualified to turn that operation over to, it takes the burden away from them.”

Step-by-step instructions
Seminar participants also receive a detailed questionnaire that leads customers through a series of questions to uncover their trouble spots.

“If you’re not comfortable diagnosing the problem, you can take it back to Ashburn and they’ll tell you exactly where the customer needs to improve and how he can do that. It shortens the sales cycle considerably,” Martin says.

The questionnaire prompts salespeople to ask questions such as, “How much waste do you have monthly? What is your disposal rate weekly/monthly? How many machines do you service? Who provides your service and how often? What is your total usage for a month, quarter or year? How many gallons do you use?”

The questionnaire helps salespeople to quickly diagnose customer problems.

“In most cases, customers haven’t thought of these things. Coolant is one of the most difficult things to change. It’s a major undertaking to clean machines and replace it with a different kind of coolant and document the savings,” Martin says.

Madden says Ashburn’s training used to be more technical, focusing on products and how to understand fluids. Today’s training is more practical.

“There was a lot of wasted discussion because, as soon as they left that room, they wouldn’t remember it,” Madden says. “Our training is much more practical now. We train salespeople to identify the key personnel in the facility and to ask questions about their processes. Then we can provide customers with real solutions that will enhance their productivity, improve their process and often save them time and money.”

For example, a production manager’s primary concern is getting parts out the door and maintaining a predictable production schedule. He’s interested in saving time. The way to capture his attention is to show him how to increase machine uptime. You do that by asking, “How long does your coolant usually last in the sump?” A typical plant might change coolants every three months.

The next question to ask is, “If we were able to clean the machine correctly and give you six months instead of three months, plus do a better job of maintaining it during off-production hours, would that interest you?”

A plant’s environmental, health and safety person is concerned about eliminating waste. He’s likely to tell a chemical salesperson, “We’re satisfied with our current disposal company.”

A savvy salesperson will answer, “Let us do an audit of your facility to verify that you’re getting the most efficient use of your product. From our understanding, you’re only getting three months of sump life. If we can increase that to six months, we can lower your waste cost. Would that interest you?”

Ashburn believes that knowing the key concerns facing various plant decision-makers is just as important to salespeople as product knowledge.

On training scorecards provided to seminar participants, salespeople typically give Ashburn an average rating of 4.2 on a scale of 1 to 5. Still, Madden says there’s always room for improvement. To reduce the amount of time salespeople spend out of the office, he hopes to shorten training sessions to one day. He also wants to offer more mobile training at distributor locations.

J.C. Tool Supply’s Martin plans to send more of his company’s salespeople to future training sessions.

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

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