Corporate citizen
Cunningham Supply's community involvement enhances relationships with employees and business partners
By Susan L Srikonda -- Industrial Distribution, 12/1/1998
In an era when the word "business" is often associated with adjectives like ruthless, greedy and even fraudulent, companies have to work hard to efface those negative images. The story of Cunningham Supply Co.'s simultaneous dedication to the community and to the bottom line demonstrates the potential for that kind of commitment to positively affect a company's relationship with its employees and business partners.Come the day before Christmas each year, Cunningham employees like Diane Fusselman, director of finance, make a mad dash for president Gary Mull's office. They're not looking for Christmas bonus checks; they're headed for Mull's box of tissues. It's a very human reaction to the experience of delivering, in person, a bounty of holiday gifts and food to a family in need.
Community outreach efforts like that one are among the reasons Cunningham Supply Co. is being honored with Industrial Distribution's Excellence in Distribution Award in the under $10 million category. The company also received the 1998 American Eagle Award given to a distributor in the Overall Category at the Spring convention of the American Supply & Machinery Manufacturer's Assn. and the Industrial Distribution Assn. Mull was recognized for Outstanding Individual Effort.
"I think it's important because we're a member of the community just as much as somebody who has a house two blocks over from here," Mull says. "And if we're not taking part of what we take out of the community -- through our earnings and profits and doing business -- and putting that back into the community, then we're not being a good citizen, whether it's a corporate citizen or a private citizen."
Cunningham's community involvement includes participation in programs like United Way's Day of Sharing, Habitat for Humanity, Jobs for Ohio Graduates, voter registration drives and various children's educational programs. The list may change from year to year, but the focus is always the same: to give back to the surrounding community.
Both Mull and his partner, Rick Glauthier, regularly demonstrate their commitment to community service. For example, both visit area elementary schools and lead students in a program called "The Wonderful World of Work."
"With the kids, I go in and talk to them about what distribution is and why I like my job," Mull says. "And I try to find out what they like to do. It's really amazing because they all have a dream at that point in time. I'll go into an inner city school and every one of them wants to be a doctor, teacher, fireman or policeman. It's a shame you can't capture that dream and make it a reality."
In "The Wonderful World of Work," the children pretend they work for a manufacturing company making parts for the space shuttle on tight deadlines. Inevitably, near the end of the manufacturing process a part comes up missing and the kids have to turn to the distributor for help in securing the part.
Mull says it's important that he and Glauthier lead by example in order to demonstrate for their employees, and for other businesses, the difference that even a small company can make in a community. Mull's efforts to affect the business community include actively following legislative proposals, tackling issues like product liability that are important to distributors, and giving feedback to legislators.
"We're a small company, so all of this is small stuff," Mull says, "but if you don't do it, you're not making any difference. If everybody pitched in and did something like that, it would make a huge impact."
Empowering employees
Both Glauthier and Mull encourage and support the community involvement efforts of their employees in hopes of bolstering their sense of pride and enabling them to think of the company as a place with "a heart and soul."
"Basically, my philosophy is that everybody needs to share. It's real important to me," says Glauthier. "The way we conduct ourselves with our [employees] is because of our genuine concern for them, not just to keep them [on staff]. That extends itself into the business community because that's just the way we are. We're not doing it because we want recognition or to win an award. We'd do it anyway."
Cunningham employees, like sales representative Scott Lookabaugh, who helped to build a Habitat for Humanity home, say that helping with community projects is a fun change of pace. Habitat for Humanity works with people in need to build and renovate decent, affordable housing.
"Habitat for Humanity was great," Lookabaugh says. "I was never that civic minded myself, but Gary's been very instrumental in encouraging all of us to get involved ... It gets me involved in things I wouldn't normally do on my own because I've got owners here who encourage me to get involved in this sort of thing, and it goes beyond that. The owners actually look at everybody's families and individual needs and you don't see that too often."
The company recently demonstrated its concern for employees by creating a resource center filled with audiovisual and print materials to help employees in their personal and professional development.
Mull's commitment to his 21 employees is also evident in his attitude toward today's ever-present prospect of acquisition. As a small company, Mull is in the position of both keeping an eye out for companies to acquire as a method of growth and being open to discussing acquisition inquiries from larger companies.
"As far as someone acquiring us, I'll talk to anybody -- you're foolish if you don't," Mull says. "But it would have to be right not just for the owners, it has to be right for the employees too. Most of these people have been here for a long time, some of them as long as 25 years. But I'm in business to make a profit, too, and if someone came along with the right opportunity, we would be open to discussing it."
Good deeds come full circle
It's difficult to draw a direct connection between a business's community involvement and a profitable bottom line. But the comments of Cunningham Supply's management and their business partners offer a qualitative analysis that suggests the two are not mutually exclusive.
Duane Wetzel, process engineering manager for Gougler Industries of Kent, Ohio, has come to expect superior service coupled with price and availability from Cunningham Supply. Cunningham is Gougler's primary supplier for tooling, shop supplies, cutting oils and coolants. Mull services Gougler with the same lead-by-example attitude that he gives to community service projects.
"The guys in the shop see [Mull] with his sleeves rolled up working for our business," Wetzel says. "There's no room in today's business for fat cats and that's not the case here. We'd hear it from the guys if he wasn't visible on the job shop floor ... but we don't hear that because Gary and his people are working for the business and that's the way it should be."
Though Wetzel's reasons for doing business with Cunningham Supply are driven by bottom-line issues like cost and efficiency, he says knowing that Cunningham is involved in the community reassures him of the company's stability.
"It tells me that I'm dealing with a solvent company that's going to be there tomorrow," Wetzel says. "When a company is involved in the community it shows stability within the company. I get flyers [every day of the week] from fly-by-night companies and I throw them in the trash. And you know that they're good people that you're dealing with. To me, that means they're looking out for me."
Cunningham has been distributing the Sandvik Coromant line for close to 20 years and Mull extends his belief in education to making sure that his employees are well trained in the Sandvik line.
"They're very technically versed in our product," says Jim Diamond, Sandvik's manager of distributor sales. "Whenever we have training classes, even into the advanced training classes, they're always well represented with their outside sales and even their inside sales staff."
From the perspective of this manufacturer, Cunningham's community involvement means that the company is that much more knowledgeable about Sandvik's potential end-users.
"Probably because of Mull's commitment to his community he understands that part of the country and what's important to them," Diamond says. "It's my opinion that what he does in his community has a business application -- understanding, getting out into the community and explaining to them about what we do in manufacturing and why it's important and to share with them other things that go into the world."
"His work with the community probably, in some indirect ways, assists with the selling of our product," Diamond says. "By having a close understanding of their customers in their local market, they can really understand what applies and what doesn't apply within the Sandvik offering. "
Cunningham sells Tyrolit North America's full line of grinding wheels and surface grinding segments with the kind of personalized service that the industry was built on, says Marianne Dodakian, Tyrolit's marketing director.
"A company involved in their community has taken the power of their business and moved it into a fourth dimension," Dodakian says. "The importance of the customer, the vendor, and the Cunningham people is further complemented by the company's involvement and support of the community."
For Mull, the ultimate benefit of a company volunteering time or money is to bridge the gap that often exists between businesses and their communities.
"Whether you get a direct benefit or not, that's irrelevant," Mull says. "I think that for the free enterprise system to be viable, you have to let people know that you're not just there to make a profit. People, generally, think that business makes money and it doesn't come back to them.
"We have to show them that businesses are sensitive to that. If you want the free enterprise system to work, you have to show everybody that there is a benefit for them ... the benefit is that it helps the whole system in general. And if you get something specific out of it, that's fine and dandy too."
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