ANNA — “I wanted to start this year’s article a bit different than the last few years that we have submitted and simply say ‘What a year we have all had.’ I went back and read our article from last year to see what our thoughts were for 2020,” said Andy Haag, director of sales. He has been with Wells Brothers for 11.5 years.
“We see 2020 as a year of continued opportunity. All indicators and equations so far are showing that it has the potential to be a solid year. Being an election year does throw some potential risks into that equation. Regardless of the outcome, we hope to see the continued investment in new facilities, additional capacity, and general manufacturing growth.”
Haag’s report continues:
As we all know, in election years, the manufacturing industry usually waits on making capital investment decisions as they wait to see which side “wins.” Regardless of who wins, three months after the election, things level off, adjust, and get back to normal. We all knew that we were going to be dealing with that but obviously no one could have predicted that 2020 was going to be the year of a pandemic. This threw a wrench into the mix that none of us has ever had to work thru before
In February/March timeframe things came to an abrupt pause until everyone tried to figure out what the next six months were going to look like. WBI, as everyone else, tightened things up preparing for a slowdown. I called it a pause and not a stop above because fortunately for us that is what it was, a 4 week pause.
We quickly learned that the majority of our customer base is “essential”. Roughly 80% of our customers fall into the food and plastics industry. A good portion of our plastics customers are also food related since their products are used for packaging of consumer products and food and beverage.
With the “essential” businesses, it was improving quality, improving processes, and expanding production to meet demand. We were able to maintain and keep our existing workforce at an average of 53 hours a week. Was it challenging, absolutely. We needed to keep our employees safe. We implemented an internal “COVID” taskforce to ensure that we were doing the right things not only for our employees, but our customers as well. Taking temperatures daily became a part of daily processes. Wearing masks became a part of day-to-day PPE.
So what is our conclusion at the end of 2020 moving into 2021:
We appreciate the hard work and dedication of our team at WBI. We could not have had the safe and successful year that we had without every one of them doing what they do…….
We appreciate all our customers and were glad to be a part of their success….
We appreciate all the frontline workers, first responders, and all in the medical field that helped us and our families get through 2020….A sincere thanks to you all
What do we think about 2021? First, let us successfully get thru the transition in our government. Second, let us continue to get thru the pandemic. Third, let us continue to live and work following our mission statement “Treat the customer and my co-worker as I would like to be treated”. If we continue to look at business from this perspective, we will see a great 2021 and beyond……
God bless to all and we wish everyone a safe and prosperous 2021!
For more information, check us out at www.wellsbrothers.com.
