Past Winner Stories
Plymate
www.plymate.com
By 1988, times were good for Plymate Inc., a commercial laundry in business for nearly 60 years. The third generation, Todd Plymate and Tracy Plymate Holt, had joined the family business, and the company was being acknowledged as the premier restaurant linen supplier in the Indianapolis area. Linen service made up roughly half of its business, with uniform and floor mat rental supplying the rest. The company had 50 employees and the luxury of requiring only one daytime shift. But all that soon changed.
"Disaster planning and recovery was something managers at Plymate had heard of and read about, but certainly not something we thought we'd spend any time on in the near future," noted president and CEO Todd Plymate.
The summer of 1988 was one of record drought. By the time a Plymate employee heard on a police scanner of a fire at the laundry one Thursday evening in July, there was no hope of saving anything.
"We rushed to the scene in time to realize the building and its contents were a total loss," said Plymate. "Thankfully, no one was in the facility at the time, so there were no injuries, or worse. But all our merchandise was up in smoke."
Though this was the second fire the company had experienced, owners found themselves on the brink of tough decisions and major changes. Priorities included communicating with employees, customers and suppliers about the situation; procuring new merchandise; finding an alternative site to process laundry and set up offices; negotiating with the insurance adjuster for cash to sustain the business; and making decisions about what to do with the facility. Lastly, they knew they had to look at the business with a critical eye.
Plymate was able to sublease a facility 45 minutes away, but work would have to be done during that facility's downtime. Employees would have to work third shift. So the company arranged to shuttle employees back and forth to do their jobs. Temporary offices were established in a vacant auto dealership. As it turned out, the company had only one day when it was unable to service its customers.
"In retrospect, the tactical decisions about how to take care of business were easier than the strategic decisions we were about to make," said Plymate.
The hospitality linen portion of the business was the most service and time demanding. If the company devoted enough resources to saving it, the owners risked losing everything. So they made a critical decision to develop and implement a business plan that hinged on growing the uniform and image mat rental segments of the business.
The family focused on a new beginning and used funds from the sale of the linen side of the business to fuel the growth in the uniform and mat segments. The family also recruited another member, Terri Plymate Warnecke, an IPS teacher, to join the company. That is the best part of being in the family business, said Plymate - the people.
"This may sound corny," he said, "but it has to be the people I work with On top of that, I have had the chance to work with both of my sisters, which has truly been a blessing."
With a new focused and renewed energy, the family rebuilt its facility to support projected growth, beefed up its image by implementing a uniform dress code and launching a TQM program. Plymate credits employees for much of the company's success. As one of the last remaining independent laundries in Indiana, Plymate will mark its 75th anniversary next year.
"Our front-line workers were instrumental in our surviving this difficult time and they will be the key to our success in the future," he said "We have a really great team of co-workers who are talented and committed to making Plymate successful."
"Disaster planning and recovery was something managers at Plymate had heard of and read about, but certainly not something we thought we'd spend any time on in the near future," noted president and CEO Todd Plymate.
The summer of 1988 was one of record drought. By the time a Plymate employee heard on a police scanner of a fire at the laundry one Thursday evening in July, there was no hope of saving anything.
"We rushed to the scene in time to realize the building and its contents were a total loss," said Plymate. "Thankfully, no one was in the facility at the time, so there were no injuries, or worse. But all our merchandise was up in smoke."
Though this was the second fire the company had experienced, owners found themselves on the brink of tough decisions and major changes. Priorities included communicating with employees, customers and suppliers about the situation; procuring new merchandise; finding an alternative site to process laundry and set up offices; negotiating with the insurance adjuster for cash to sustain the business; and making decisions about what to do with the facility. Lastly, they knew they had to look at the business with a critical eye.
Plymate was able to sublease a facility 45 minutes away, but work would have to be done during that facility's downtime. Employees would have to work third shift. So the company arranged to shuttle employees back and forth to do their jobs. Temporary offices were established in a vacant auto dealership. As it turned out, the company had only one day when it was unable to service its customers.
"In retrospect, the tactical decisions about how to take care of business were easier than the strategic decisions we were about to make," said Plymate.
The hospitality linen portion of the business was the most service and time demanding. If the company devoted enough resources to saving it, the owners risked losing everything. So they made a critical decision to develop and implement a business plan that hinged on growing the uniform and image mat rental segments of the business.
The family focused on a new beginning and used funds from the sale of the linen side of the business to fuel the growth in the uniform and mat segments. The family also recruited another member, Terri Plymate Warnecke, an IPS teacher, to join the company. That is the best part of being in the family business, said Plymate - the people.
"This may sound corny," he said, "but it has to be the people I work with On top of that, I have had the chance to work with both of my sisters, which has truly been a blessing."
With a new focused and renewed energy, the family rebuilt its facility to support projected growth, beefed up its image by implementing a uniform dress code and launching a TQM program. Plymate credits employees for much of the company's success. As one of the last remaining independent laundries in Indiana, Plymate will mark its 75th anniversary next year.
"Our front-line workers were instrumental in our surviving this difficult time and they will be the key to our success in the future," he said "We have a really great team of co-workers who are talented and committed to making Plymate successful."