ISO 14001 Teaches Americhem Employees Environmental Awareness

Our company’s plant in Cuyahoga Falls, Ohio, recently became certified to ISO 14001, which is a family of standards related to environmental management. It helps companies minimize any negative impact on the environment, comply with laws, regulations and other environmental requirements and continually improve in these areas.

As part of the team that worked on achieving this accreditation, I was amazed at the amount of awareness that this process promoted throughout our plant and our employees. By becoming aware of ways to reduce waste in one area, our people were motivated to look for opportunities to conserve in other departments, plant processes and even at home.

It’s amazing how working toward this certification empowered our employees to become conservationists. Once plant personnel were aware that I was part of the team working toward ISO 14001, they brought a wealth of ideas to my attention. I was asked if we recycled cans, ink cartridges and lots of other items that were beyond our initial thinking.

I think that speaks volumes about the certification’s relevance to everyone. Conserving what we have is not only good for the environment, it’s good for business. We learned that there are many waste streams that we can be paid for instead of paying someone else to dispose of them. Cardboard and polymer waste are two great examples. Through our initial “dumpster dive”, where we literally looked at all the things we throw away in a week’s time, we uncovered many waste streams that we were able to reduce, conserve or sell.

Now, I notice people conserving not because it’s a requirement, but because they care about it and it’s the right thing to do. During the process, our registrar interviewed more than 30 employees, and they discovered a lot of engagement and pride that the process helped promote. They were amazed by all the different ways that employees answered a question like, “How does your job impact the environment?”

The team that helped work our way through the requirements did an excellent job. It was a lot of hard work over months and months. But a lot of credit also goes to our employees who helped make the project their own. Many of them will carry this newfound awareness home and expand on our sacred company principle, “Be a proactive steward of the environment.” The impact is clear to our people, our community and the world at large.

You can view our certification and get more details  on all of our ISO accreditations on our website.

Darwin Brown

Quality Manager, Americhem Inc.

The Four Unique Stakeholders of Americhem Inc.

At Americhem, we still hold true to some of the original principles that were instilled in us by our company’s founders. Over the years, these main beliefs have helped guide us in difficult times and in prosperity alike. Its part of what we believe as a company; that we have certain obligations to four groups of stakeholders that help keep us in business. Without the support of any one of these groups, we can’t survive or grow. So, straight from our official Americhem Principles, let’s take a look at all four groups.

· Customers – We believe that our relationship with our customers should be a partnership, because when our customers are growing, Americhem grows too. We treat customers with respect and strive to solve their toughest challenges, whether or not those challenges are related to our products and services. We do our very best to provide our customers a superior product and a good overall value.

· Employees – We want Americhem to be a place for the brightest and most talented employees, and a place where they can enjoy long-term employment. In fact, 39 of our employees have been with Americhem for 30 years or more, with our top tenured employee serving 45 years. That’s over seven percent of our workforce that has 30 years of service or more. We respect the dignity of all of our employees and promote two-way communication, emphasize safety and expect and reward excellence.

· Suppliers – We also view our relationship with our suppliers as a partnership. Much like what our customers expect from us, we expect quality, service and value from our suppliers. We value our supplier relationships, because they often provide Americhem with innovation, technical support and competitive advantage.

· Community – As a corporation, we practice good citizenship by maintaining friendly relations with our communities, environmental stewardship, and helpful giving and community service. We also encourage our employees to contribute and participate in community service. It’s all about giving back to those who have helped make us successful.

Paying attention to these four vital groups has proven to be a successful formula for us over the years. As Jawaharlal Nehru, the first prime minister of India said, “Failure comes only when we forget our ideals and objectives and principles.” That’s why we remind ourselves frequently of their importance at Americhem.

President's Post- Planning

Fall is an exciting time for Americhem, the new fiscal year is upon us. We get to watch our months of preparation and planning come together to benefit the company as a whole. It really is invigorating to see the plans we have been working on come to life for 2015 and beyond, to have learned from 2014 and to push forward growing as a company.

It’s important to step back and assess your business, to check that you have the necessary tools to reach the company’s financial and operational goals. But above all, this is the time to work with your employees, making sure your employees are motivated in their work environment. This critical factor is key to a competitive advantage in the market place.

I am proud of what Americhem was able to accomplish during 2014, and I have high hopes for 2015. This year we received multiple technical certifications, presented a successful Color Trends program, doubled the size and capacity of our plant in China and rebranded our online presence.

However, Americhem is not immune to the trends of the economies around us. The key to business growth into a new year is being vigilant in how you respond to the macro-economic trends for the economies and markets you are working in. Finding balance in an up and down economy can be tough, but through thorough planning I believe it can be done. In the end, a plan is only as effective as its first day.

Read more with our article in Plastics News.

John Deignan

President, Americhem Inc.

The Importance of Giving and Community Service

Americhem has been dedicated since its inception to being a good corporate citizen. Our founders believed in the caring for the community and giving to worthwhile causes, and that tradition has been carried down through several generations of Americhem employees over the 73 years we’ve been in business.

Our belief in altruism helps improve the quality of life for the residents of the communities that we do business in. According to Truist, a web-based corporate philanthropy platform, “By getting involved in causes that directly impact members of the local community…the company can actually improve the quality of life of those who make up the bulk of their consumer base and their workforce, both current and future. (Source)

At Americhem, we take this philosophy to heart. Some of our community service and giving programs include:

· Our Mansfield, Texas plant, which adopts a needy family every year around Christmas. Funds raised by the plant have gone to help pay a portion of the family’s mortgage, purchase the family’s childrens clothing and Christmas gifts, food, and other funds for the adults to use as they see fit.

· Our Concord, North Carolina plant raises money every year for the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation, participating in the annual Walk for the Cure and other fundraisers. The goal is always to exceed the previous year’s giving.

· Our Suzhou, China plant has helped raise money for recent earthquake victims as well as supporting a variety of orphanages including Suzhou City, Xiangcheng, and Wuzhong District.

· Our Dalton, Georgia plant participates in a number of charitable events throughout the course of the year, including Feed-A-Family, food drives, blood drives, and blanket drives for homeless citizens. They even received the employee participation award for having the highest percentage of employees participating in planned giving to the United Way.

· Our Manchester, England facility has conducted a number of fundraising campaigns to benefit Springwood Primary School in Manchester. The school provides special education for students 2- to 11-years-old that have profound, complex and challenging needs.

· Our Liberty, North Carolina plant participates annually in the Marine Corps Toys for Tots program, and the plant holds nonperishable food drives at Christmastime.

· Our two facilities in our headquarters town of Cuyahoga Falls, Ohio have raised money and gifts for a wide variety of projects, including a current holiday toy drive to benefit Summit County Children’s Services, book drives for needy students, and an annual fundraising event to benefit Akron Children’s Hospital.

And for the second year in a row, Americhem is donating the money it would have spent on holiday cards and postage to a worthy charity. This year, it’s Heifer International, a global organization committed to ending world hunger and poverty.

Even more compellingly, our plants always take care of fellow employees in need, whether victims of house fires, natural disasters, cancer or other severe illnesses. It’s always refreshing to see the outpouring of support when a co-worker needs it the most.

So beyond making our communities better places to live, Americhem people believe in helping others in our workplace, communities, and the world. We are true believers in the words of American clergyman and social reformer Henry Ward Beecher, who once said, “In this world it is not what we take up, but what we give, that makes us rich.”

Giving Thanks

At this time of year and always, Americhem has a tremendous amount of things to be thankful for. We know that you do, too. It’s been said that the only obstacle to being thankful is simply not observing with attention. We grow used to our blessings and we start taking them for granted, without realizing that they truly are blessings.

Well, in 2014, it has been an easy for me to notice the things that make me happy to be part of the Americhem family. In no particular order, they are:

-  I’m thankful for our company founders, Richard H. Juve, Harvey Cooper and Sylvester Caldwell, all of whom had vision for what a great company could become.

-  I’m thankful for the more than 500 Americhem employees and their families. It is a wonderful team to be a part of.

-  I’m thankful for our customers who continue to rely on us for high-quality products and services. I’m thankful for those who view our relationship as a partnership, since this is how we view our customers.

-  I’m thankful for our suppliers, another group with whom we form partnerships. I’m thankful for those who provide consistent quality and service that in turn makes our own products better.

-  I’m thankful for the communities that we do business in. They are eight wonderful communities around the world. I’m thankful for our employees in each of these locations that participate in community service organizations and that contribute to worthwhile charities to help make their communities even better.

-  I’m thankful for the favorable business climate Americhem has experienced in 2014. While no years are without their challenges, Americhem has thrived and made a profit, as it has every year since we've been in business in 1941.

-  I’m thankful that we’re a global organization and that we can learn from our employees around the world. I’m thankful for the different cultural traditions that, while different from my own, are nonetheless fascinating to observe and learn about.

-  I’m thankful to work for a company that has such a rich history. I’m glad that this history has been passed down from generations of employees and that the company is still rooted in its founding principles all these years later. I’m also thankful for the generations of employees who have, with their strong work ethic, set an example for us to follow.

-  And finally, I’m thankful for our company’s holiday policy, which allows those of us in the U.S. to enjoy a day off from work to be mindful of our blessings and to celebrate them with our families.

See, it’s easy if you try – try to observe with attention and be thankful. I wish all of our employees, communities, suppliers, customers and everyone else a very Happy Thanksgiving 2014.

Scott Blanchard
Senior Corporate Marketing Specialist, Americhem Inc.