McElroy Metal Insider 2023 Volume 1
It’s hard to believe that it’s already been over a month since our National Meeting. From casual conversations to survey results, we all agree that getting the large group together provides a much-needed opportunity for networking and the exchange of fresh ideas.
During our time together, you undoubtedly picked up some things you could implement in your daily functions for yourselves and/or the teams that you manage. The big question is, what have you done with those topics since you’ve been home? If you’ve made some changes, tell us about them on the form at the bottom of this page, and you might even win some FREE stuff!
If you haven’t made any changes and instead slipped back into status quo, consider this your gentle nudge. Given the cost and time commitment invested in hosting the meeting, don’t we owe it to ourselves as employee owners to make sure we’re using what we gained those four days to make us all better?
To that end, we’ve made a commitment in Marketing to keep the meeting top of mind for us all, so we’ll be publishing reminders and sharing success stories throughout the year on topics like:
- Saying YES instead of No
- Asking How Can it be Done
- Asking How Can it be Done Differently
- Asking How Can it be Done Differently
Adelanto Plant - Park N Shade is an AZ customer that is primarily Purlin and has very complex punching. They recently requested 14 truckloads of material between two jobsite (11 trucks on one, 3 on the other) to all deliver on the same day at both jobsites. They wanted improved dates beyond what they originally requested, which we were able to meet after much effort considering our high volume in Purlin as well as managing coil to ensure it arrived earlier that originally scheduled.
We then had to coordinate storing material at our facility as well as work with our carriers at preloading trailers and storing them for final delivery. They then asked the trucks to deliver between Mon-Wed, which we altered established plans to accommodate. All truck are delivering this week.
Before we started a real push on accommodating customers with tough demands, like this out of Adelanto, this would never have happened. The message was "think outside of the box, and find ways to say yes". This team now goes above & beyond on a consistent basis to meet or exceed customer’s expectations.
Metal Mart Burnett placed an order for Medallion and noted special crating requirements.
However, the special crating requirements were not noted on the order. Sunnyvale was about 50% into the order when the error was found and a change request was sent by CS.
Once Sunnyvale learned that the customer had to have the special packaging, the decision was made to build new crates and repackaged after the fact.
I believe that there was a high probability that a year ago panels would have been sent as originally packaged, but we are trying to find ways to say yes.
Quality, Service & Performance
During the Owners Roundtable meeting, many groups discussed the need to return to our previous levels of quality, service and performance. Those three traits have been the foundation of our growth for 60 years and it’s critical they remain top of mind on a daily basis.
Ian recently shared the thoughts below with the corporate management team.
“After 3 years of record months, things are returning to normal across our industry. To compete and succeed in this environment we need to return (at a minimum) to our pre-pandemic service levels, lead times, and communications. In 2019 we were considered among the best in our industry and as we enter the new year we all need to focus on what we can do to be considered the best in our industry in 2023.”
If you haven’t already, ask yourself the following questions:
- How can you or your team improve the quality that our customers receive?
- What can you personally do to improve the service that we offer?
- How can you change what our customers think about our performance?
Closing Banquet
Ken kept the early part of the evening light as usual with his great sense of humor and witty awards! But we also had some bittersweet moments by celebrating former Vice President of Sales, Mark Lawson’s, retirement after 38 years with McElroy Metal.
