-: Hi there, welcome to this month's "High Bar University."
He's Rick, I'm Caleb
and we're sitting in our brand new facility
in Owatonna, Minnesota and, boy, it's nice.
-: It is nice, yeah.
Yeah, we got the plush seats, the recliners,
everything going here.
-: He's talking about a movie theater.
I'm not sure what your... (laughs)
-: What do you have in your office?
I, that's what I... -: (Caleb laughing)
-: I know some people get all the perks, right?
I mean, just look at this guy. -: That's right.
-: No, we're in a new facility here and it really is nice.
What are your favorite features of the new building?
-: Well, first of all, I get to see everybody again.
I mean coming off the past year and everything.
I mean, we've all been kind of in solitude
and so just to see everybody again,
or to be able to connect again is certainly great.
Anytime that you have a new facility
you take a lot of pride.
Boys with their toys, right? -: Right.
Rick: I mean, you got to have new toys
to come to work with every day
and it matches the toys that I have in my office
that I get to play with every single day.
-: Well, it is nice, everyone's under one roof, so to speak
and in our old facility
we were under three different campuses, essentially,
but we've nearly doubled our operating space,
which is fantastic
and I know that there's just so many advantages
to our new facility here.
Rick: Yeah, the optimization
and efficiencies that we have going on
in the warehouse and the manufacturing facility,
which is all now under one roof.
Just the communication
and the flow of the product and everything
has certainly a great benefit to everybody.
Caleb: Oh, I know that I've talked
to many operations folks
and I know that they're not gonna ever miss
driving a forklift in January in Minnesota,
between buildings, outside. -: Right.
Yeah, that was the thing about our old campus,
our old warehouse and manufacturing campus
is that they were separate buildings
and sometimes you had to take product
from one building to the next
and in Minnesota winters, that they don't get along
with those tires on the forklifts very well.
-: That's for sure.
So, I mean, when you talk about our product,
the fact that we receive it in one area,
it goes through the molding machines
into shipping and out the door.
It's, like you mentioned,
it's a lot more efficient in this new environment.
Rick: Which only helps our distributors.
The great thing about coming off this past year
is we are super busy. -: Yes, oh my goodness.
Rick: And so lead times on certain products
have actually ticked up just a little bit,
but it's more of because we are just so busy
and while we haven't had many supply chain issues,
there's been some little components and such,
maybe on our seats or whatever,
that have slowed us down just a tick.
But when orders go in, orders go out here
and even though
we were very proud of our turnaround times before,
those are only that much more efficient
and even more than just the lead times
is there's just less handling of the products, right?
So, it's not changing hands as often,
it's not traveling as far and, therefore,
the quality of the product is only going to improve.
Now, we certainly didn't have much of issues for bad product
or things of that nature,
but this is going to reduce that to basically nothing.
-: Absolutely without question.
And, of course, when you're talking about this new facility,
we manufacture all of the Minimizer products here,
but also, obviously, Premier manufacturing, high bar brands.
There's that potential for cross-docking
at some point in the future.
I mean, is that something that we're thinking?
-: We're definitely looking at it for sure
and whether it's towards the beginning of 2022?
We definitely, that is what we're planning for, right?
-: Right. -: I mean,
more space allows us for product expansions,
new product development,
as well as cross-docking with the Premier brand,
which is going to be wonderful.
The Premier facility is out in Tualatin, Oregon.
Minimizer can send product to Tualatin
and then Premier
can send product to the facility in Minnesota.
Lead times, as far as the traveling and such,
that's going to be reduced,
whether we're sending Minimizer products to the West Coast
or we're sending Premier products to the East Coast.
-: Right. -: And so again,
that's going to service our customers that much more.
-: Well, I can just hear guys now thinking,
it's great you guys have a new facility
but can I get that product a little bit quicker?
And I think that this building allows us to do that.
-: Right, and certainly
the greatest benefits to having a new facility
probably goes right to the employees here.
-: Absolutely. -: But there are
a lot of great benefits that go to -
-: Our customers. -: our distributors
and our end users at the end
because of the lesser lead times and travel times
as well as just the pride and the happiness
that our employees are gonna have.
So, when you're calling that customer service team,
they're not going to be nearly as cranky as they used to be.
Caleb: (laughing) I don't think they were ever cranky.
-: No, certainly one of the best crews in our industry,
but they're even going to be happier than they were before.
-: Well, and I can attest to the fact
that now that we're all back, in this new facility,
but back together,
it's been a great environment in which to work
these past few weeks, for sure.
-: Yeah, absolutely, and we're proud to be here
and, certainly, we couldn't do it
without all of our great customers and our distributors.
So, this really is a shrine to you, the customers.
-: Absolutely.
Well, Rick, thanks so much, sir.
-: It's always a pleasure.
-: See you guys next month.