Year in Review: Giving Back 2016

Happy New Year Americhem! We are proud to have given back in 2016 both in our local communities and on a global scale.

We are honored to be able to support several organizations this season. Throughout the year, Americhem’s facilities in the Americas raised money for United Way, while also donating food and other goods to families in need this holiday season. We set high goals, and strive to exceed them all while having fun and serving our communities. Our plants across the US host chili cook-offs with employees competing for the top cook title, food drives for local school children and entire days of service in hopes of bringing joy and an extra hand to our neighbors.

Our dedication to our communities expands to a global scale with our annual holiday card. In lieu of paying for printing and postage for our annual card, Americhem sent an ecard and donated all funds saved to UNICEF on behalf of our customers.

Americhem is proud to have a workforce so dedicated to making a difference. As one of our guiding principles, our employees strive to live the Americhem values in and out of the workplace. As an organization, we value those who go the extra mile. Lonnai Meraci of Vi-Chem was recognized this year at our annual Sales and Managers’ Meeting for her efforts to improve the lives of others.

When Lonnai Meraci first joined Vi-Chem in 2003, the company participated in the American Cancer Society’s Making Strides Against Breast Cancer 5K walk. The walk gives the community an opportunity to unite and honor breast cancer survivors and raise awareness. The money raised helps the American Cancer Society fund ground breaking research, provide support and mammograms to those who normally would not be able to.

Since then, Lonnai has participated in the walk every year. She has taken the lead to pull 14 or more people to walk every year, and raised thousands of dollars. Her passion continues to build awareness and participation each year.

Americhem hopes to continue to work and inspire our employees, partners and communities to give a little extra in  2017!

Americhem and Junior Achievement

Americhem’s partnership with Junior Achievement started with retiree Rick Mathew, who served as our COO in the early 2000s. As a long-term member of Junior Achievement, Rick brought the program to Americhem and I took a personal interest.

I believe that giving back to the community is important. A colleague and I chose to work with high school students. This decision was important to us because these students are getting ready to graduate and enter the world as adults, and we thought that they would really benefit from a real-world business education.

Six years ago we held our first session at Stow High School. We joined a teacher who taught an impressive business management course. Every year for seven weeks, my colleague and I teach courses to this business management class. We start with business ethics and move onto entrepreneurship, which is really fun to do with the students.

When teaching entrepreneurship, we ask the student to create a business. During each step of the business development process, we teach business terminology and best practices. The end result is having the students pitch their “businesses” to potential investors. It is amazing to see their creative spirit. The pupils take the program seriously and are quite impressive. I can remember one year a student arrived dressed as a pig to promote his business where every kind of food was wrapped in bacon.

The classes we work with are amazing. We open ourselves up to be their mentors and there are students that have continued to stay connected after graduation. We had one student who came to Americhem after she graduated high school to intern with us for four years while she was attending college.

In 2011, a colleague here at Americhem and I were nominated by our teacher/partner from Stow High School and won the Northeast Ohio Junior Achievement Volunteer of the Year award and we are now part of the Junior Achievement’s Hall of Fame. That was a really great moment because even though we voluntarily worked with these students and observed their progress, the acknowledgement that we were making a difference in their lives was quite an honor.

I look forward to teaching the classes every year and I believe that Americhem and Junior Achievement make great partners to give students the tools to excel as they continue their education and move into the business world.
 

For more information about Junior Achievement and how you or your business can be part of this great program visit their website.

Christa Batton
Human Resources Manager - North America, Americhem Inc.

Innovation - Laying the Groundwork for Success

Since the beginning, Americhem has been an innovator with a keen focus on providing high-quality products and services. Americhem has built a very compelling reputation and global brand. This is evident when speaking with our customers.

As we plot our business strategy for the coming years we ask ourselves, “What made Americhem stand out for our customers over 73 years and what can we do to build upon that legacy of innovation?” I have made some observations that I hope you can take and apply to your own business strategies.

Do what you do well. Build a foundation to strengthen and expand your core competencies.
Americhem’s core competencies in color science, dispersion, formulation, weathering and technical bench strength, together with our willingness to tackle big challenges lead us to our greatest opportunities. Identify what makes your business stand out. Take these core competencies, use them as building blocks and infuse them with everything your business does.

Be well connected to the market.
A close customer connection provides a great springboard for innovation. Unfiltered technical-to-technical relationships are instrumental to a growing organization. They provide the opportunity to better listen, observe, problem-solve and anticipate future trends.

Build a strategic technology roadmap and an innovation portfolio that promotes concepts.
By building customer needs into a strategic technology plan and innovation portfolio, there is a higher probability that you will engage customers early and be market leaders.

Ideas + Commercialization = Innovation
Ideas are only ideas without our ability to bring viable products to market. At Americhem, we introduced a development process to help teams navigate the complexities of product development and launch. What kind of ideas have been mentioned around your office? Maybe now is the time to gather ideas and brainstorm how to bring them to market.

Developing an innovation mindset.
Good innovators connect dots, challenge the way things are done and understand that experimentation is vital to gaining new insights and new knowledge. Curiosity, sharing, documenting and experimenting are all traits of an innovative organization.

Innovation is at the forefront of any business growth strategy. I’ve shared with you some of the key initiatives that can bring innovation to the head of your business strategies. The world is always looking for something new, something creative and something that shows how your company is innovative.

Wendy Shuttleworth

Director of Research and Development, Americhem Inc.

Colors with Meaning

At Americhem, color is our business. We work with color every day and we know what makes a good color. With our high color standards, we take a lot of care when choosing the colors to represent our company. We used a tool known as the Dewey Color System®, which is considered the world’s first statistically valid color test that utilizes extensive opinion testing to scientifically verify the common links between color and emotion. With this system, we were able to accurately choose company colors to convey our company values.

Navy Blue
Navy Blue expresses a sense of authority, stability, and efficiency. Over the past 73 years, Americhem has been established as an industry authority. We work hard to educate through our Americhem U  series of courses, to host presentations at industry trade shows, and to be an available resource for our customers.

Navy signifies a company that is stable and efficient and is depended on by its customers. Trust and acceptance from our customers are important. We consistently follow our company principles, holding ourselves to maintaining the highest of ethical and moral standards with our customers.

Sage Green
Sage Green indicates nature and wholesomeness. It represents Americhem’s dedication to being eco-friendly and preserving the natural environment. We recently attained ISO 14001 certification for our Cuyahoga Falls, Ohio plant. This distinction recognizes Americhem for environmental management solution dyeing process  that saves water and energy while eliminating waste material.
systems. We are also the leader of the eco-friendly solution dyeing process that saves water and energy while eliminating waste material.

Green generates a calming, relaxed mood and shows that a company is genuine, forthright, and sincere. Our ability to surpass the competition is dependent upon the collective drive and intellect of cohesive teams. We work in partnership with our customers to create the best available solutions.

Burnt Orange
Burnt Orange is the color chosen to accent our two main colors. While not part of our logo, burnt orange still plays an important part in our company image. It represents Americhem’s specialty in uncovering solutions to problems. Americhem is dedicated to being your problem solver. Some of Americhem’s best selling products came into being as a result of our responsiveness to a specific customer problem.  From idea to reality, we collaborate with our customers to overcome product design challenges and to meet exacting color and end use property specifications.

Orange embodies our innovative spirit and responsiveness to customer needs. Our research and development team are constantly working on polymeric research that leads to groundbreaking technologies  for our customers. We strive to improve our own efficiency and effectiveness to provide the best value and innovations to our customers.

Aubrey Barto

Marketing Assistant, 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.