How our Service Technician went beyond fasteners, all the way to bicycles.
Service Technicians are what makes a VMI program great. Any vendor will keep your cabinets stocked. At Southern Fasteners & Supply, we train our Service Technicians to think beyond the basics—to always be looking for ways to make your operations more efficient and cost-effective.
When our Service Technicians arrive at your site, they’ve got their radar on. They’re aware of what’s going on beyond the bins. Their main job is replenishing those fasteners, but we’ve learned that a productive idea might strike at any time, to a Service Technician who is paying attention.
One time, our guy helped trim our customer’s bicycle budget. Our customer’s facility covered 300,000 square feet—two buildings side by side, with one cabinet to serve the whole operation. Maintenance techs used bikes to get from one side of the building to the fastener cabinet. At the same time, there were forklifts zipping about. Our Service Technician thought that the number of vehicles (both two- and four-wheeled) was just too high.
He proposed a second cabinet, strategically placed, to cut bike time dramatically. Our customer paused, thought for a moment, then said “Why didn’t we think of that?” He and our Service Technician went straight to the facility manager’s office and put the idea on the table.
Our customer loved the idea. In short order, a new cabinet was installed, and the company was instantly saving countless man-hours of bike-riding. In addition, the likelihood of an accident plummeted.