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Transcript
Ken Raycroft of Briggs Equipment
David Maloney, Editorial Director, DC Velocity :
How do you make sure your warehouse equipment is safe for multiple users? Manufacturers adjust their supply chains during the pandemic, including some leaving China. And warehouses without automation brace for added stress this holiday season.
Pull up a chair and join us as the editors of DC Velocity discuss these stories, as well as news and supply chain trends, on this week's Logistics Matters podcast. Hi, I'm Dave Maloney. I'm the editorial director at DC Velocity. Welcome.
Logistics Matters is sponsored by Fortna. Fortna partners with the world's leading brands to transform their distribution operations to keep pace with digital disruption and growth objectives. Known worldwide as the distribution experts, Fortna designs and delivers intelligent solutions, powered by their proprietary software, to optimize fast, accurate, and cost-effective order fulfillment. For more information, visit Fortna.com.
As usual, our DC Velocity senior editors Ben Ames and Victoria Kickham will be along to provide their insight into the top stories of this week. But to begin today, how do we assure that warehouse equipment is safe for workers to use over multiple shifts? To address that question, here's Victoria with today's guest. Victoria.
Victoria Kickham, Senior Editor, DC Velocity :
Thanks, Dave. Our guest today is Ken Raycroft, national service director for construction and material handling equipment dealer Briggs Equipment, based in Dallas. Ken has more than 20 years of logistics and operations experience, and he oversees service operations throughout the United States for Briggs. He has been deeply involved with the new lift truck sanitization program, designed to help businesses continue to operate in the face of Covid-19 challenges. So we asked Ken here today to talk about those challenges.
So Ken, welcome.
Ken Raycroft, National Service Director, Briggs Equipment :
Good morning.
Victoria Kickham, Senior Editor, DC Velocity :
So, there's growing concern about workplace health and safety as businesses reopen and we continue to fight the Covid-19 pandemic. I wanted to ask you how this is playing out in warehouses, specifically as it relates to the machinery and equipment that employees use.
Ken Raycroft, National Service Director, Briggs Equipment :
It's been interesting. Everyone obviously wants to take necessary precautions needed to protect their employees. Our customers have really been great to work with, and adapted to including additional steps at the beginning of a repair opportunity at a customer site. We've implemented pre-work wipe-down processes at the high-touch point for our technicians. So, before they begin a task at a customer site on a piece of equipment, they're, they're taking the steps to wipe the equipment down. We've implemented the process, when they finish their repair, they're also doing a wipe-down at the end. So, it's really evolved into a two-step process, with sanitation before we do the job and after we finish the interaction with the lift truck. And we're making sure we're looking out for everybody's health and safety, both the customers' operators' and our own employees' and technicians'.
Victoria Kickham, Senior Editor, DC Velocity :
Briggs is a dealer for Yale and Hyster equipment and services, and Hyster-Yale introduced a lift truck sanitization program called Hy-Shield. It was designed in direct response to the Covid-19 pandemic and concerns about warehouse worker health and safety. Can you describe the program and what it entails?
Ken Raycroft, National Service Director, Briggs Equipment :
Yeah. Yeah, it's been really great working with the Hyster-Yale Group in the, as a manufacturer that was able to take the lead and give customers—ultimately give customers what they need, through the Hy-Shield program.
[The] program was developed in collaboration with the dealer network that supports Hyster-Yale lift trucks across the United States. We met, put together a task force, and we were meeting on a weekly basis, so we—pulling insights from best practices and thoughts and insights from all the dealers across the country, that were living the frontline experiences with what was going on in the Covid, in the Covid hotspots. So, what we discovered is, you know, most of the dealers were doing a little bit of everything differently. So, working with the Hyster-Yale Group and meeting weekly, they took all that information and consolidated into a technicians' best practices document, which has been, which has been fantastic. Very effective way to leverage the entire dealer network and figure out the solutions based on the evolving situation that was on the ground.
A lot of customers don't do their own maintenance. They utilize the dealer network and dealer technicians to take care of their equipment, so we quickly realized that customers were foregoing necessary maintenance on equipment due to the strict social distance guidelines and the fear of the facility—of inviting outside suppliers and vendors and technicians into their facilities to perform the necessary service. Which is completely understandable, due to bringing outside personnel into a facility, not knowing—at that point, we didn't really know how to protect and keep the equipment clean and protect our employees and the customers' operators. So, the Hy-Shield program was developed to encourage the proper maintenance and allow our technicians to get back in there taking care of the customer equipment, make sure we're taking care of the needed repairs while we're properly sanitizing it, during all steps of the contact with the lift truck and the maintenance.
So, we really, the Hy-Shield program includes, the makeup of it includes customizable sanitation kits and services based on the customer's needs. Not only the technician best-practices guideline, but the educational information that was put together for the operators to implement best practices on the equipment. Put together visual guides of the high-touch points on each truck. And then there's additional sanitation services offered that, if a customer needs a deep-clean situation or requires additional practices to be followed at their facility, the dealer, the dealer network can help organize that for the customer.
Victoria Kickham, Senior Editor, DC Velocity :
Great, thank you. So this is something that the technicians from the dealers, as well as the equipment operators, do, and it's a set of best practices and products and that kind of thing. Is that what you're describing?
Ken Raycroft, National Service Director, Briggs Equipment :
Yeah, that's right. I'm making the product available so it can—customizable for the model—make, model, lift truck, and the customer's application. The products that go into the Hy-Shield kit can be customizable, whether it's wipe-downs or spray or sanitation spray. Gloves. The different different things that go in it, yeah. It can be used for the customer operator it can be designed for the customer operator to take the steps to wipe down the truck. And it can be designed, is designed for the dealer network technicians to also have access to that product.
Victoria Kickham, Senior Editor, DC Velocity :
So, I wanted to ask too, have hygiene issues and equipment cleaning always been part of the larger industry's sort of safety protocol, or is this something entirely new?
Ken Raycroft, National Service Director, Briggs Equipment :
Yeah, this part of it's really new. We've implemented a gloves program for our technicians many, many years ago, and that was more focused on cut-resistance and safety, injury protection, whatnot, but not so much on the biological hazard side of it. So, yeah, this is new.
Victoria Kickham, Senior Editor, DC Velocity :
I wanted to ask, too: You know, there are a variety of different forklifts and equipment in use in warehouses. Do you have different protocols for cleaning different types of equipment? Are there different rules? How does that work?
Ken Raycroft, National Service Director, Briggs Equipment :
Yeah, not really so much for the different types of equipment. It's really focused in on the high-touch points, where we we've identified the high-touch points on the equipment: the operator compartment, the handles, the main levers, the steering wheel, the seat belts, obviously, things like that. So, we're going through the process of sanitizing and wiping down the high-touch surface areas. So it's really, regardless, whether it's an order picker or a sit-down counterbalance truck or a walkie and rider, anywhere the operator's touching the equipment, we're making sure we're taking steps so the customer's operator is protected and our technicians are.
Victoria Kickham, Senior Editor, DC Velocity :
That makes sense. We've learned a lot about Covid-19 since March, but much of the science and guidance continues to evolve. Do you expect forklift cleaning and sanitation and sanitization protocols to evolve as well?
Ken Raycroft, National Service Director, Briggs Equipment :
Yes, that's really going to be interesting. A lot depends—obviously, the touch points are going to remain the same. The way the operators interact with the equipment, the way our technicians interact with the equipment, that's obviously going to remain the same, but the level of sanitization and the products, the cleaners and the products that are identified as being effective, obviously, we're gonna follow CDC guidelines. And a lot of the direction and guidance for the evolution of this will obviously be coming from the information the CDC puts out.
Victoria Kickham, Senior Editor, DC Velocity :
That makes sense. In general, I wanted to ask, too, how are customers responding to industry efforts like yours, aimed at improving overall health and safety on the job? So, you know, what are your, how are your customers reacting?
Ken Raycroft, National Service Director, Briggs Equipment :
Yeah, I mean, at the very beginning of this, it was, there was a lot of hesitation from our customers to allow any outside service providers into their facilities. So, by building the Hy-Shield program, and in working on the technician best practices documents, that's evolved and changed to where we're gaining the confidence of the customer that we're taking the necessary steps to protect their operators and their employees as much as we are taking the steps to protect our employees and our technicians.
So, it's really, it's really been interesting to see the transition from, everybody's very cautious, nobody's allowed in the facility, that we've established a process, and the Hy-Shield products allowed us to gain the confidence of the customer to get back into the facility. So, customers are fully aware of the need to protect not only their employees, but also our technicians. So everybody's responded extremely well, and we're working well together with our customer base.
Victoria Kickham, Senior Editor, DC Velocity :
That's great. Thank you. And I'm sure there's lots more work that you'll have to do as businesses continue to re-open, so—. Well, Ken, thank you. Thank you very much for joining us today. We really appreciate it.
Ken Raycroft, National Service Director, Briggs Equipment :
You're welcome. Thank you.
David Maloney, Editorial Director, DC Velocity :
Thank you, Ken and Victoria. Now let's turn to some other supply chain news from the week. Ben, the pandemic is leading many companies to adjust their supply chains, including pulling their sourcing and manufacturing out of China. What are we seeing?
Ben Ames, Senior News Editor, DC Velocity :
That's right, Dave. This was a survey that came from the industry analyst firm Gartner, and they spoke with 260 companies with global supply chains between February and March of this year. And they found that 33% of those companies have either moved their sourcing and manufacturing activities out of China, or they plan to do so in the next two or three years. They've been, instead, looking at sourcing those activities from other locations like Vietnam, India, and Mexico.
That survey did happen, as I said, in February, March, so that was fairly early in the Covid-19 outbreak. But the survey did find that there were a number of causes for the trend. And that included Brexit, which was something [that] was in the headlines for many months, that we all saw, before the current pandemic, and the trade war between the U.S. and China, which has levied some rising tariffs on imports and exports.
David Maloney, Editorial Director, DC Velocity :
But that's easier said than done, to change an entire supply chain. There are costs to making that change, right?
Ben Ames, Senior News Editor, DC Velocity :
There are definitely pluses and minuses. In the same survey, Gartner found that 58% of respondents, almost six in 10, said that building a more regionalized or localized supply chain in this way can result in additional structural costs in their network. For example, that can make it harder for them to operate with just-in-time inventory, with the sort of lean inventory approach.
But the upside is that a localized supply chain is designed to be more resilient, because it gives the companies better visibility and the agility to shift the sourcing or manufacturing or distribution activities quickly. In turn, that lets them cut the delays and shortages in times of disruption, which we've all seen happened in recent months here, because the manufacturing is now happening closer to the source of demand. So it really is a whole re-thinking of some of these supply chains.
David Maloney, Editorial Director, DC Velocity :
It'll be interesting to see how this plays out over the next couple of years. Thank you, Ben.
And to move from the broader supply chain to inside the four walls: Victoria, you wrote this week how distributors that haven't invested in automation in their warehouses will feel the added strain this coming holiday season. Can you explain why?
Victoria Kickham, Senior Editor, DC Velocity :
Sure, happy to. This is a survey as well, and it came from voice software provider Voxware. It's an annual consumer survey that they do, and it showed that Covid-19 buying behaviors are likely to place additional strain on DCs this holiday peak season, as you say, especially those that haven't optimized or invested in a lot automation strategies.
They surveyed 500 consumers earlier this month—I think June 4th to 9th. And it showed they, that most plan to shop earlier, send more packages directly to recipients, and buy more online, including last-minute stocking-stuffer items traditionally purchased in stores. And those changes, they say, mean that many DCs will have to kind of re-think their strategies around a lot of different processes: inventory, picking, fulfillment, technology, automation, and those sorts of things.
David Maloney, Editorial Director, DC Velocity :
What kinds of changes may distribution centers have to make to adjust for this?
Victoria Kickham, Senior Editor, DC Velocity :
Yeah, a couple of things.
Well, first, because of changing behaviors, you know, they'll have to deal with sending items from a single order to multiple addresses, you know, as people do more Christmas shopping and they send it directly to recipients, you know, they'll have to deal with that, you know, a single order going to multiple places.
And they'll also have to deal with orders that include items that may be smaller and difficult to pick and pack—like I said, those traditional stocking-stuffer items.
So, just those two issues alone will cause them to have to re-think things like how to optimize item selection, dealing with order sorting, label printing, boxing things—not to mention gift wrapping services, is probably gonna be something they need to do as well. So, and they have to do all this while meeting growing expectations of a smooth online shopping and delivery experience, which is something that customers have been demanding, you know, for years now as e-commerce has increased in general. So, it's just sort of all intensifying as these online buying behaviors continue to grow and change.
David Maloney, Editorial Director, DC Velocity :
Well, it certainly will be a different kind of holiday season this year. It will be interesting, again, to watch how all this unfolds. Thank you, Victoria. We encourage listeners to go to DCVelocity.com for more on these and other supply chain stories, as well as our continuing Covid-19 coverage and a list of resources. That's all available on DCVelocity.com, so go there to check it all out.
Thanks, Ben and Victoria, for sharing highlights of the news this week.
Ben Ames, Senior News Editor, DC Velocity :
Thank you, David. It's always fun.
Victoria Kickham, Senior Editor, DC Velocity :
Thank you.
David Maloney, Editorial Director, DC Velocity :
And again, our thanks to Ken Raycroft of Briggs Equipment for being with us today, and we encourage your feedback on this topic and all of our stories. You can email us at podcast@dcvelocity com.
And a reminder that Logistics Matters is sponsored by Fortna. Fortna partners with the world's top brands to transform distribution operations into competitive advantage. Expertise includes distribution strategy, DC operations, micro-fulfillment, automation, and intelligent software. Distribution solutions designed today for tomorrow's challenges. Learn more about the distribution experts at Fortna.com.
We encourage you to subscribe to Logistics Matters on Apple, Google, Spotify, Stitcher, or wherever you get your podcasts. Just search for "logistics matters" to find us. Our new episodes are uploaded each Friday. And we'll be back again next week with another edition of Logistics Matters, when our guest will be David Henry of GlobalTranz, to talk about the start of USMCA and what shippers need to know about cross-border transactions, so be sure to join us. Until then, please stay safe and have a great week.
