Kimball Midwest maintains staffing levels
Despite recent economic uncertainty, Kimball Midwest, a national industrial supplier based in Columbus, Ohio, has maintained full staffing levels during the coronavirus pandemic.
The company, which serves end-use customers through a team of more than 1,000 sales representatives in communities around the United States, has never laid off associates during previous economic downturns. That’s a record the company intends to maintain during COVID-19, according to Pat McCurdy, president and CEO.
“One of our core values is that we are a people business,” McCurdy said. “That means we strive to treat our people and our customers the right way, especially during challenging times. That’s why we’re doing everything we can to support our associates, whether they work in our offices, our distribution centers or directly with our customers from coast to coast.”
As the pandemic developed, Kimball Midwest took several steps to help protect the health and safety of its associates and customers while also maintaining operations. Among other things, the company restricted all non-essential business travel and transitioned more than 95 percent of office associates to remote work through at least May 31.
The company has also completed a virucide cleaning of all office and distribution center locations, implemented aggressive physical distancing requirements in the distribution centers, including split shifts to reduce the number of associates working at one time, and sent hand sanitizer and gloves to all sales representatives.
Kimball Midwest has been executing email campaigns and phone support to help promote online sales activity and provided additional promotional programs to help the sales team and end-use customers. Its annual sales meeting, which had been scheduled in Dallas in early April, was held online instead.
A dedicated page on its internal website compiles all pandemic-related information and updates in one place.
“Everyone in the organization is focused on how we can support our customers and sales team during this challenging time,” McCurdy said. “We are confident in our ability to remain a trusted, essential business partner through the pandemic.”
At the end of each of his weekly videos to update the company’s associates around the country, McCurdy emphasizes his confidence in the Kimball Midwest team, saying “We have faith in our people, we have faith in our country and we have faith in you!”
INDUSTRIAL SUPPLY MAGAZINE
The March/April issue of Industrial Supply magazine features an in-depth cover story about Joyce Lansdale and Vallen. Plus, we're featuring articles by contributing writers Dirk Beveridge, Frank Hurtte, and David Kahle, as well as interviews with numerous product and distribution industry experts.
