30,31,32,34,36.qxt:Channel Wa
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30,31,32,34,36.qxt:Channel Wa
PHOTOS BY MIKE DeFILIPPO BEST PRACTICES STORY BY A. LEE CHICHESTER CHANGE FROM AT FLORENCE, KENTUCKYBASED WISEWAY SUPPLY, INTERNAL RESTRUCTURING IS REFLECTED BY AN EXTERNAL REBRANDING CAMPAIGN. hirty-five years ago, Biz and Jackie Cain founded Wiseway Supply, efficiently serving a residential builders’ marketplace that needed plumbing and electrical supplies, home lighting fixtures, kitchen cabinets, and appliances. The service area was primarily Florence, Ky. Both Wiseway and the marketplace have evolved since that time. The building market has become more commercial, and Wiseway has grown—under the leadership of Biz and Jackie’s sons, John Cain, president, and Charlie Cain, senior vice president—to five branches (including a lighting showroom and a corporate headquarters). Still, outsiders’ perception of the company remained unchanged. To change this, Wiseway’s principals took control of the way the company is perceived by undertaking an internal restructuring that is reflected by an external rebranding campaign—all of which is more than just a simple logo redesign. The company has developed communications tools to tell the world that it’s family owned, professionally managed, progressive, and energetic—and that its 35 years of “knowhow” translates into “can-do” for customers and vendors. “Outsiders will form an opinion of your company,” said John Cain. “You can let T Wiseway Supply’s John Cain (left), president, and Charlie Cain, senior vice president, headed up the efforts to create a consistent counter look as part of a rebranding initiative. 30 T H E E L E C T R I C A L D I S T R I B U T O R ■ D E C E M B E R 2 0 0 7 ■ w w w . t e d m a g . c o m yourself be branded, or you can do the branding yourself.” Starting on the inside At the suggestion of management consultant Diane Egbers of Leadership Excelleration, the Cains began developing and assembling a leadership team that would spread the decision-making responsibilities among professionals drawn from both the company and the industry. “Charlie and I felt that there weren’t enough hours in the day for the two of us to be wearing all of the hats in this growing company,” said John Cain. “We’d been the primary engines behind the growth of the company until that point— but we didn’t want to become the ones that were holding it back.” Among those chosen to redistribute leadership responsibilities were 11-year veteran of the company Marianne Brummett, director of marketing, and Tim Fries, vice president of sales and marketing. “I didn’t know a thing about Wiseway when John first approached me,” said Fries. “So I asked around, and what I heard from the outside was that the company was perceived as a small, familycontrolled, residential organization. Some people knew Wiseway only as an electrical supplier, while others knew it as strictly plumbing oriented. I went back to John and met more of the Wiseway leadership, and saw a group of dynamic, energetic, future-oriented, and progressive people. The two perceptions didn’t match up: Wiseway was going places— but everyone thought it was the same as it had been 30 years ago. We initiated a process to change that.” In addition to building a professional management team, structural changes outlined in the strategic plan included moving the corporate offices into a newly refurbished headquarters building in March, pushing the inside sales functions down to the branch levels so they’d be closer to their customers, and updating each branch counter area to be consistent in look, lighting, and location of material. In several cases, new branch buildings were required. “We’ve found that the look of our facilities is important in our effort to convey the scope of Wiseway,” said Brummett. “Consistency of appearance goes a long way toward conveying a professional attitude.” Continued on page 32 Wiseway Supply’s new company logo is displayed on the sign and building located at the front of the distributor’s Florence, Ky., branch, and on the company’s new fleet of trucks. w w w . t e d m a g . c o m ■ D E C E M B E R 2 0 0 7 ■ T H E E L E C T R I C A L D I S T R I B U T O R 31 BEST PRACTICES Continued from page 31 Along with ease of access, arrangement of material was critical so that neither electrical nor plumbing contractors would feel neglected by the company. Today, the leadership includes specialty managers for each division, giving each sector professional oversight. Also, the commercial quotations division has been consolidated into the corporate offices, and the company’s unique ability to offer both electrical and plumbing is being leveraged into a new focus on MRO clientele—again, with the hiring of an experienced professional to oversee that aspect exclusively. “Know-how” meets “can-do” Once the internal foundations had been renovated, Wiseway’s leadership put into place a strategic marketing plan to develop tools to communicate the reality of the company into the wider marketplace, including their vendors. The team looked outside of the organization for help. “We felt we were just too close to the trees to see the forest,” said Charlie Cain. “I think Tim and Marianne are perfectly capable in this regard, but we needed an objective viewpoint.” So Wiseway hired Marcia McMillen, president of McMillen Creative, a consulting firm specializing in branding. “I started by researching the actual opinions and perceptions of the company’s existing customer base,” she recalled. “I asked not only what they envisioned Wiseway as being able to provide, but also what the company wasn’t providing to serve their needs. Knowing what your weaknesses are is as important as knowing your strengths and opportunities. The final piece is understanding the competition. “In some branding processes,” she continued, “the management looked at the company and decided it should be this or that—without looking around to see what services were already being provided, who was growing fastest and why, and who was moving into the area. In my experience, that’s not going to be a successful approach.” McMillen discovered that the company’s existing marketing tools weren’t bridging the gap between what it really did in the marketplace and what it was perceived as being able to do. 32 T H E E L E C T R I C A L Marianne Brummett, director of marketing The new branding is quite visible—as seen here in the waiting area, and above in signage. “A brand is a bridge that you design and construct to span that gap,” said John Cain. “It’s always evolving as the company and the needs of the marketplace grow and change.” D I S T R I B U T O R ■ D E C E M B E R 2 0 0 7 ■ “Even our own people had their various perceptions of what Wiseway was, depending on which branch they worked at and the types of customers they served,” Continued on page 34 w w w . t e d m a g . c o m BEST PRACTICES Continued from page 32 noted Charlie Cain. “There wasn’t a unified message being communicated, and that was mostly because we had not shaped the message.” With her research, McMillen has found that Wiseway’s long-time customers appreciate not only the 35-year legacy of local marketplace knowledge, but also the agility and a youthful “can-do” attitude not found in enormous multinationals. Managers adopted this as the company tagline and began building the com munications tools around it. Together, they considered a new look; key written messages, new line cards, and a corporate packet designed to convey diversity, professionalism, and energy. “The brand has to come organically, from inside the company,” said McMillen. “It has to be expressed outward with consistency and excitement, and always in the same key. The marketing materials we create aren’t the brand—those support the brand. For a brand to be successful, everyone using it has to be completely comfortable with it, from the managers straight through to the truck drivers.” “This isn’t something we’ll accomplish in one day,” noted Fries. “While we continue to evaluate how closely we have achieved our goals in terms of communicating our brand, we will constantly be flexing it to fit the new realities we expect to achieve into the future.” “This doesn’t mean we’ve abandoned our past,” added John Cain. “We’re very proud of our history and our legacy. Our past is literally the foundation upon which we’re building everything else—this is a construction process, not a tearing-down of anything.” Once the branding tools were de veloped, the company threw a party to introduce the new communications tools to employees. Excitement, buy-in, and energy percolated throughout the staff as the new internal structures received an external representation that was as professional as the company’s employees felt. Many customers, vendors, neighbors, and even competitors were impressed when the signs, trucks, letterhead, invoices, counter areas, and logo wear hit the street earlier this year. Long-time customers appreciated the new look, but they 34 T H E E L E C T R I C A L basically knew the best-kept secret in all of the company’s capabilities already. LaShele Montfort was once a pur chasing manager for a potential Wiseway customer. “You can never take back that first impression,” she said. “I was a customer to a lot of outside salespeople, including Wiseway. The company’s old materials didn’t tell me much about them and D I S T R I B U T O R would go into the stack piled on my desk. Even though the salesperson was very good, I had a million things on my mind, and the materials he left behind were not all that impressive. “After the introduction of the new look, I said, ‘Wow. This company has its act together,’” she continued. “It got my atContinued on page 36 Tim Fries, vice president of sales and marketing BEYOND LETTERHEAD Providing value to vendors is a key focus at Wiseway Supply. “Keep in mind that effectively communicating your brand to the marketplace cannot only be a recruitment strategy for customers and employees—but for vendors as well,” noted Tim Fries, vice president of sales and marketing. “The tools we’ve developed are hands-on representations of the fact that behind them we have a strategic marketing plan with specific steps we’ll follow to reach measurable goals. That kind of preparation demonstrates to vendors that we can be a full partner in their own marketing goals.” Planning marketing strategies, setting goals, and becoming functional partners with vendors should be critical aspects of the rebranding process. “I’m a firm believer in setting common goals and working together to achieve them,” said Mike Altomare, vice president of Hubbell Lighting. “The more distributors can work with manufacturers to define what the value is and how you’re going to deliver it, the more successful both parties will be.” “In the past, our impression was that Wiseway did not share our goals. But that’s changed,” said John Born, midcentral district sales manager for Leviton Manufacturing. “Their last presentation to us in the buying group meeting was impressive. Not only was the new look refreshing, but the professionalism of the delivery of their message sent a positive signal to our regional vice president. He told me this was one of the best customer presentations he’d ever attended. “We wish more distributors would do their homework like Wiseway,” Born continued. “Distributors need to know not only what their own placement and direction in the marketplace is, but also the position and needs of their manufacturer partners. With a partnership like what we enjoy with Wiseway, we achieved double-digit growth last year—exceeding our expectations for the area.”—A.L.C. ■ D E C E M B E R 2 0 0 7 ■ w w w . t e d m a g . c o m BEST PRACTICES Continued from page 34 tention and made a good impression because it communicated the scope of what Wiseway is capable of. I remember thinking, ‘I don’t want to be left out of this.’” The new look will become the old look, however, with time and exposure. This is why Wiseway stresses that the brand is more than a line card, letterhead, or a logo. Professionalism is also communicated via infrastructure. “The new headquarters reflects Wiseway’s growth and the new image they’re greeting their vendors with,” said Mark Altomare, vice president of Hubbell Lighting. “The difference in perception between meeting in their showroom and in the new conference room is very important to us, and helps demonstrate Wiseway’s commitment to our goals and needs.” Why Wiseway? Several of the newest recruits to the company from outside tell stories about a dawning recognition of Wiseway as an exciting company to work for. “As I was considering this move, friends would ask me, ‘Wiseway? Why Wiseway?’” said Randy Van Huss, outside sales, electric division. “It was that separation between what was really happening here—which was dynamic, exciting, and progressive— and what outsiders saw. I had to explain to a lot of people what the reality was.” As a recruitment tool, the rebranding process has generated excitement and curiosity among industry insiders. “I wondered why I hadn’t heard of the energy of this company before,” said Montfort. “As I was thinking about joining the excitement, I met this or that person, and said to myself, ‘It’s just this individual who’s really dynamic.’ And then I’d meet another one. And another. Everyone here is really energized and motivated. I came right on board because it was so exciting.” One of John Cain’s primary goals in renovating his company’s perception in the world was to ensure that his people were proud of their involvement with Wiseway. From the inside, employees have always known how great it is to be a part of the organization—but where would their reality collide with outsiders’ perceptions? This was one of the main reasons that the Wiseway management team knew the 36 T H E E L E C T R I C A L A sales training session takes place in the company’s Florence, Ky., headquarters. existing branding bridge wasn’t doing its job. The employees shouldn’t have to explain, “Why Wiseway?” “Our employees have become so excited to be a part of this organization,” said Brummett. “From the new corporate headquarters to the new paint on the trucks—everyone has felt a significant burst of pride. They see the new management team in place and they see changes in how we do business and how we communicate our business to the world. Energy levels are sky high.” “This business is truly how you treat people,” noted Fries. “We’ve set specific internal goals and everyone knows they’ll be held accountable to help attain them— everyone has a road map to our future and we know exactly how we’ll get there. People appreciate that and are excited about participating in that process.” It’s important to have substance to back any new look. For Wiseway, it’s not just a trial balloon inflated and floated over the marketplace—”know-how” really must meet “can-do” for a branding effort to be successful. “We can point to the fact that we’re doing something right when we’re hearing feedback in the marketplace,” said Fries. “I don’t think we would hear that feedback if we weren’t doing something exciting or new in the market.” “I’ve worked with other companies that have not done their homework,” said McMillen. “They don’t know what they are, D I S T R I B U T O R ■ D E C E M B E R 2 0 0 7 ■ or don’t know what they want to be in their marketplace. Wiseway began with a marketing plan; it knew its position in the marketplace and how to draw on those competitive advantages. This told my team how best to differentiate Wiseway from its competition. With the marketing plan, we had a road map to develop the brand—they’d targeted specific goals and detailed steps to reach them. If the company hadn’t been fully behind the strategy, then it would have been no more than smoke and mirrors.” “A brand is the vehicle that will convey your company’s future,” said John Cain. “A logo redesign is an expense—a rebranding process is an investment.” ■ ■ ■ Chichester can be reached online at [email protected]. AT A GLANCE Headquarters: Florence, Ky. Trading Market: Greater Cincinnati Year Established: 1972 Principals: John Cain, president, and Charlie Cain, senior vice president Locations: Florence, Ky.; Dry Ridge, Ky.; Loveland, Ohio; Monroe, Ohio; and Harrison, Ohio Employees: 108 Affiliations: IMARK, NAED, WIT, HBA, ASA w w w . t e d m a g . c o m