Toyota Honors Top Dealers With President's Award

IRVINE, Calif. (March 30, 2010) – Toyota Material Handling, U.S.A., Inc. (TMHU) recently announced the 2009 winners of its prestigious President’s Award. TMHU selects its top dealers each year from a nationwide network of 68 dealers and 188 dealership locations, recognizing them for demonstrating excellence in parts, service and equipment sales, customer satisfaction and overall dealership operations.
This year, 15 winners earned the coveted award and were acknowledged at Toyota’s National Dealer Meeting in Orlando, Fla.
“Each year our dealers go above and beyond to demonstrate top quality service and support,” said Brett Wood, president of TMHU. “The President’s Award provides TMHU with a way to showcase their achievements and honor their dedication to their customers and the material handling industry.”

The winners are:
• Al Rawson of Atlas Toyota Material Handling, Schiller Park, IL
• Ron McCluskey of Brodie Toyota-Lift, Lawrence, MA
• Anika Conger Capelle of Conger Toyotalift, Green Bay, WI
• Jeff Fischer of Florida Lift Systems, Inc., Tampa, FL
• Bob Whittingham of Forklifts of St. Louis, Inc., St. Louis, MO
• Brian Hull of Hull Toyota Lift, Elkhart, IN
• Ted Wente of ILT Toyota-Lift, Cleveland, OH
• Sam Swartz of JRC Toyota-Lift, Worthington, OH
• Don Herman of Lift, Inc., Mountville, PA
• David Graffy of ProLift Industrial Equipment, Louisville, KY
• Jim Shoppa of Shoppa’s Material Handling, Ltd., Fort Worth, TX
• John Scheunemann of Toyota-Lift of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN
(psst... American Warehouse Systems is part of Toyota-Lift of MN)
• Ken Townsend of Toyota Lift of South Texas, San Antonio, TX
• Mark Andres of Toyota Material Handling N. California, Hayward, CA
• Ken Turnmyre of Vesco Toyotalift, Hickory, NC

The President’s Award, TMHU’s highest honor, has been awarded to select dealers since its inception in 1990 to acknowledge their outstanding business accomplishments.

About Toyota Material Handling, U.S.A., Inc.
Celebrating more than 40 years of established operations in the United States, Irvine, Calif.-based TMHU has been the No. 1 selling lift truck supplier in the U.S. since 2002 and currently offers a full line of high-quality lift trucks sold under the Toyota brand. TMHU, as the sole United States distributor for Aichi, now offers a line-up of aerial work lifts, including scissor lifts, crawler and wheeled boom lifts designed specifically to meet a wide range of indoor and outdoor needs.
Quality, durability and reliability are the hallmarks of the Toyota Production System practiced at Toyota Industrial Equipment Mfg., Inc. (TIEM). Most of the Toyota lift trucks sold in the United States are manufactured at TIEM, a zero-landfill facility, in Columbus, Ind.
TIEM, and all Toyota manufacturing plants in the U.S. and Canada, comply with the ISO 14001 standard from the International Organization for Standardization (ISO), and have been honored for their environmental management systems and dedication to continuous improvement.
Toyota’s commitment to excellence in customer service extends nationwide. Sixty-eight authorized Toyota Industrial Equipment dealers, with a total of 188 dealership locations throughout the United States offer comprehensive customer service and support, including one-stop shopping for both new and used lift trucks, rentals, parts and service, fleet servicing and financing.

Warehouse Pallet Rack Safety - OSHA Recommendations

How many times have you questioned the stability or capacity of the racking in your warehouse? Is the load too heavy for the beams? Does the forklift operator know how to properly place the pallet in the rack? Can the uprights withstand a collision with a forklift? These are common and very reasonable questions. Every company should focus on internal safety and have or create an internal safety committee to address these concerns.
Following OSHA guidelines to the letter is still not enough to keep your employees safe. OSHA does not have regulations in place today for pallet racking, but you don’t have to go far to hear about a terrible accident that occurred with warehouse rack. Pallet rack safety is a crucial part of overall company safety and must be attended to. Employers should require pallet rack safety along with forklift training for every warehouse employee and manager.
Start by contacting a reputable material handling distributor, preferably one with an OSHA Alliance already in place. The distributor will be able to assist with the proper rack configuration, design specifications and the equipment to move the materials. They should also be able to do a repair or replacement survey of your existing pallet rack and submit a proposal to implement the plan.
A qualified contractor will ensure your uprights are plumb, beams are level and connections are secure. Each upright must be properly anchored into the concrete floor according to industry standards. All beams should have a safety lock. Whether it is a nut and bolt or integral fastener, the safety lock will help prevent accidental dislodgement of the beams. It is strongly recommended that each beam and upright is properly labeled with the capacity of the component. Each beam’s capacity is labeled per pair and an upright’s capacity is for one assembly. Keep in mind; moving beam levels after the design is complete could affect the capacities and you should check with your distributor before making these changes.
Palletized loads should be made stable before being placed in the racking system. Move the load onto a quality pallet, stretch wrap the loose product, and / or use wire decking on the beams to prevent falling materials. Wire decking is designed to hold evenly distributed loads on the surface area of the deck, which would require the pallet to be placed on the beams as well. Your standard wire deck is NOT designed for point loading or concentrated loading. Have your distributor explain the difference and provide you with solutions to your special applications.
Never climb the pallet racking, maintain proper lighting and practice good housekeeping. Make inspections, routine maintenance and training part of your safety program. Inspections will turn up damaged uprights, beams and wire decks. Have a qualified contractor repair or replace damaged components immediately. Do not attempt to repair pallet rack internally, not only is this extremely dangerous to attempt, you will void your warranty and most likely be held liable if a failure should occur. For additional safety you should add post protectors to the pallet rack uprights and guardrails at the ends of the aisles to keep warehouse vehicles from contacting the rack. You should also use rack back guards to prevent pallets from accidentally being pushed through the back side of the system.
For more information on warehouse safety please contact American Warehouse Systems at 877-677-9066 or http://www.aw-systems.com/.

Can This Pickle Get More Followers Than @markjuelich?

There is a well known Facebook story where the pickle defeats the rock band. I won't go into it here but it does bring up several questions about social media and human beings.
Let's take Twitter for example. I have in past blogs written about the social"ness" of Twitter and the desire for people to become part of a group of like minded individuals. I often like to think of Twitter as a social party where several groups of friends are gathered discussing different topics. If you jump into a group you can join in the discussion. What if you were in one of these circles anxious to join in only to realize everyone but you was a recording on a machine? You try to interact but all they do is spout out the same gibberish all day long.
In my opinion this is becoming somewhat of an issue on Twitter. There are so many automated systems out there it is very difficult sometimes to recognize who is real and who is a piece of software.
I had a conversation with a Twitter user the other day who was upset that he had been tweeting to his followers all day about raising money for disabled vets (a fantastic cause) but no one responded. He did some research only to find out the vast majority of his 600 or so followers sent every tweet out via 3rd party automated application! Of course he received no response from them, they weren't there.
There are some automated Tweeters that have hundreds of thousands of followers and never interact at all. These fully automated systems are essentially the pickle. These people / companies are participating in a global social party where building relationships is key yet they send a pickle in place of a human. One more step, the "man behind the pickle" obviously doesn't care about his followers or their opinions. The MBTP believes himself to be a font of information that thousands will flock to. The MBTP likes to lecture not listen.
Please don't misunderstand my thoughts and feelings for automation. I believe automation is a very useful tool if used in moderation. I and many like me spend a great deal of time relationship building on social media sites like Twitter. When I mention someone in a tweet I guess I expect that some human being will be reading it and responding. Where I come from that's just the polite thing to do.
So in answer to my own question; Yes Mark, the pickle not only can get more followers than you but it does everyday. I wonder what that says about: the pickle? it's followers? me? the world in general?
Go ahead, visit me on Twitter; @markjuelich, I'm really there.

Storage of Military Gear - The TA-50 Locker

This week I thought I would actually write about a storage product, the TA-50 gear locker. This product is about as misunderstood and confusing as they get. I guess it starts with the name, TA-50. My guess is most civilians don't really even know what TA-50 means and perhaps a few in our armed forces aren't quite sure what it actually stands for.

TA-50 is short for Table of Allowances 50; now does that clear it up for you? No? Simply put, TA-50 is Government issued (military) individual equipment. Anything a soldier might have that is government issued is considered TA-50.

The second big issue with TA-50 Lockers is most customers believe there is some standard size and that TA-50 is actually a specification. This is not true. We have made TA-50 lockers in virtually all conceivable configurations from simple wire partitions with swing doors to locker style cabinets to walk-in cages with shelving units to, etc. etc. etc.

The image to the left is what most military customers think when they are sourcing TA-50 lockers. While we are more than happy to make the vanilla one, keep in mind if you need special helmet inspection panels or redundant locking systems or any other unique specification, we can design it and it's still a TA-50 locker. Heck, we'll still make them for you even if you're not storing TA-50!

Read more about our TA-50 lockers on our TA-50 Military Gear Locker Page.

Do My Twitter Followers Know What Material Handling Is?

As many of you know I am first and foremost a marketing person, specifically business to business (or Government) marketing on the Internet. By the grace of God we have been able to grow American Warehouse Systems from two guys in a storage closet (literally) to one of the largest suppliers of material handling products to the US Federal Government. All of this business has been generated by Internet traffic (to date we still don't have a yellow page listing).

Through the years we have relied on leading edge SEO and other Internet marketing strategies to bring our customers to us. With the dawn of social media, for this blog specifically Twitter, I have turned a great deal of my attention toward this "new" marketing resource.

The way to achieve your business goals on Twitter is actually quite easy in theory. You find your target market, get them to follow you, pitch your product and they buy. Unfortunately in reality it's really not that easy even if you are very familiar with how Twitter works. A quick search on Twitter or some third party help can quickly bring you to your target market (assuming you know who they are) and you can follow them hoping they will follow you back. They might but if you spend every day trying to pitch your product you will lose each and every one of them and fast. People don't go to Twitter to hear sales pitches they go for community. You target market exists on Twitter to be part of a community of like minded individuals not the target of never ending commercials.

In order to be successful on Twitter you need to become part of the party. You need to find someone in your organization that has a passion for the same things your target market has a passion for and let them Tweet. For American Warehouse Systems this was easy. I started AWS with the intent to sell to the American Government specifically the military for which I have a passion. My target market is basically me, God fearing, right wing Americans. Unfortunately for others, they don't have the advantage of an emotional connection with their market. On the other hand maybe someone in your organization does. It is certainly worth looking into. Faking a connection to "join the party" is pretty transparent and won't get you far.

OK so you've found someone in your organization who is on the same wave length as your target market. Now what? You need to become part of the community. You need to invest in the conversation and let people know you are a human being with the same interests as them. In short you need to make friends. Sitting in the corner listening and hoping they will come to you doesn't work. Get out there and get involved. Don't be afraid to voice your opinion (but don't forget you are representing your company - read your social media policy).

Lets say now you are involved and you have a great big group of followers that comprise both your passion and your target market. How do you get them to buy your product? There is no easy answer here. People "run" from the virtual salesperson faster than the Fuller Brush Man. You can't pitch your products on Twitter and retain your quality followers.

For the most part I don't pitch our products or services on Twitter (or my blog for that matter). I Tweet about things I love; America, our Armed Forces, politics and internet marketing. To this point I have been approached several times with the question; Do your followers even know what material handling is? I guess for me the answer is; "I don't know and I'm not sure I care". Analytics today can show me that a great deal of traffic (people) travels through Twitter and my blog to our website. I can't tell you what their motives are or if they are their because they need material handling equipment or are just interested to see what we do. I can tell you that Twitter is our highest traffic source outside the major search engines and our website is the source of virtually all our revenue (outside current customers and referrals (who probably came from the Internet originally)).

I think if you are looking at Twitter as a pure sales tool, you will probably be disappointed. Twitter is a group of communities that have come together for a long conversation. If you become part of this conversation, you will meet people (just like the "outside" world). If you are decent and these people like you and your ideas (Tweets) they may end up checking out your "business" side and perhaps place an order someday. This process is not unlike getting to know your neighbors, in fact it is the same.

The long and short of it is; Your company should be on Twitter to become part of the same community that your customers are a part of. You should be involved in the same issues they face and Twitter is a great place to come together. Twitter is not a direct sales tool, it is a relationship building tool. Building relationships outside of the sales arena often builds trust and credibility. Trust and credibility often lead to sales.