Bradford White Corp.

Bradford White Corporation, an industry-leading American manufacturer of water heaters, boilers and storage tanks, is providing critical support for the fight against hunger this holiday season with a $5,000 contribution to the 12^th annual KFI PastaThon benefitting Caterina’s Club.

KFI-AM’s annual fundraising event helps the Anaheim-based Caterina’s Club meet the needs of struggling families and individuals in Southern California every year.

“Bradford White is committed to helping build stronger communities and ensuring our neighbors have the opportunity to experience a happy holiday season,” said Rebecca Owens, senior manager, communications, at Bradford White. “We’re proud to work with KFI-AM and Caterina’s Club to serve families in need and demonstrate our ongoing support for the communities where we live and work.”

KFI-AM delivers stimulating talk and news radio in Los Angeles and Orange County. For more information, visit https://kfiam640.iheart.com/.

Caterina’s Club provides warm meals, affordable housing assistance, and job training to homeless and low-income families throughout Southern California. For more information, visit https://caterinasclub.org/.

For more information about Bradford White Corporation, visit https://www.bradfordwhitecorporation.com.

Top manufacturer in water heating and storage earns third consecutive honor as champion of utility energy efficiency

Bradford White Corporation, an industry-leading American manufacturer of residential, commercial, and industrial water heating and storage products, is proud to announce that it has received the 2022 ENERGY STAR Partner of the Year Award for Sustained Excellence from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the U.S. Department of Energy.

“Receiving this award for the third year in a row is a testament to Bradford White’s consistent innovation when it comes to engineering, manufacturing and marketing energy efficient products,” said Carl Pinto, Jr., senior director of marketing communications for Bradford White.

“Our company’s commitment to creating reliable, sustainable products that reduce energy consumption and carbon emissions helps commercial facilities managers and homeowners throughout North America make a real difference for our planet and save on their monthly energy bills, too.”

“We know it’s going to take all of us working together to tackle the climate crisis, and the 2022 ENERGY STAR award-winning partners are demonstrating what it takes to build a more sustainable future,” said EPA Administrator Michael S. Regan. “These companies are showing once again that taking action in support of a clean energy economy can be good not only for the environment, but also for business and customers.”

Each year, the ENERGY STAR program honors a group of businesses and organizations that have made outstanding contributions to protecting the environment through superior energy achievements. ENERGY STAR award winners lead their industries in the production, sale, and adoption of energy-efficient products, homes, buildings, services, and strategies. These efforts are essential to fighting the climate crisis and protecting public health.

Winners are selected from a network of thousands of ENERGY STAR partners. For a complete list of 2022 winners and more information about ENERGY STAR’s awards program, visit energystar.gov/awardwinners.

What lessons did the Bradford White team learn in 2020? In a year dominated by COVID, COVID, COVID, we learned the value of flexibility and communication above all else.

Early in the pandemic we were able to successfully assert that we—as a company, in our factories, our distributors and our contractors—are essential to the health of the country. We can’t do without hot water for sanitation, cooking, cleaning, and bathing in hospitals, nursing homes, military installations, food processing plants and in America’s homes. Our contractor customers are vital and essential providers of heat and hot water. There was much that we didn’t know back then, and supply chains began to shut down. Adding to the confusion, the U.S.-based supply chain was operating under different COVID rules and restrictions than what we saw with non-U.S. suppliers. We worked through the initial uncertainty about how we could best protect our employees and stabilized our factories in Middleville and Niles, Michigan, and Rochester, N.H.

We’re entering a new phase of COVID-19 these days, with an evolving sense of normalization. We’re still currently running our plants to maximize employee safety, and we’re doing so in a market where there is high demand for our products.

Photo Credit: Alan Carlson, Armbrust Plumbing & Heating

We follow state and national requirements for PPE. We run through health protocols daily with a questionnaire and a temperature check for all employees, and we’ve adjusted our scheduling to handle that. We exercise social distancing where possible and employ contact tracing measures when necessary. We clean and sanitize our factories frequently. It’s been gratifying to hear feedback from those business partners who are authorized to come into the factory that we are going above and beyond to keep employees safe compared to what they’ve seen elsewhere. I feel very good about what we’re doing to look out for the health of our employees while striving to meet our customer commitments.

You can’t communicate enough. Constant communication with our customers is crucial. We understand our distributors’ day-to-day demands and frequently communicate with them through our sales team and rep network. All their manufacturers have been affected and in different ways, so distributors have a lot of questions. We share information with contractors through our For the Pro® site, and the contractors we talk with have all been busy.

The same goes for our employees. Communicate and then communicate some more. It’s imperative to share reliable (and factual) information with our employees to avoid confusion. If people can’t get reliable information, they may fill in the blanks and fuel an already overflowing COVID rumor mill. We had about 150 employee communications last year and 80% of them were associated with the pandemic. You have to make sure your employees understand what it takes to be safe both in and out of the workplace. The coronavirus has been particularly difficult because information on the disease and availability of vaccines varies from state to state and even county to county.

Where’s the best guidance coming from? It’s difficult to say what’s the best source, but the CDC appears to have been the most consistent central source for national guidance on what to do for health and safety during the pandemic. Local information can vary by county or parish or municipality. In southwestern Michigan and southeastern Pennsylvania for example, where two of our facilities are located, the guidance varies from county to county, so one county may be on the second phase of shots while another county is barely in phase one. Our Canadian-based team must look to the Canadian government for guidance nationally and then understand what each of the provinces are saying.

How many of these practices will live on beyond the COVID-19 era? As far as products, we’ll continue to see increasing levels of connectivity and remote diagnostics, particularly on the commercial side of things where building management systems are commonplace for monitoring performance. This is not new, but the constraints of COVID have caused an acceleration in the development of more remote capabilities.  Virtual learning will continue, but we believe that “hands-on” training experiences will continue to be preferred. In terms of our general industry dynamics, a lot of us are anxious to reduce our time in the virtual/remote world. For us, this is a relationship industry and we like to see our customers and suppliers face to face. We’re most effective when we can be with a contractor in their own space to understand their challenges. You need to ride shotgun in the truck so you can see what they see and hear what they see and hear. And a virtual trade show is not a substitute for the discoveries you can make seeing and touching new products. For a company like Bradford White that prides itself on its face-to-face customer relationships, this has been painful.

This pandemic has altered almost everything in our lives, including food, water, healthcare supply, healthcare delivery, supply chains, insurance plans and contracts. As we prepare for the next pandemic, the planning must include economic recovery along with the health aspect. We were looking at the bullseye, but we missed many of the rings around it. Now we can see how big of an impact COVID-19 has on all facets of our lives.

When it comes to doing business during a pandemic, you can’t deny the human element. When you talk about somebody’s health and well-being, including any challenges they’re experiencing regarding their financial health and well-being, it becomes emotional. As much as you might want to employ common sense and logic when it comes to work, people have lost loved ones and lost jobs. Plus, the coronavirus has become part of the partisan political landscape when we need to be bipartisan when it comes to taking care of the health of the country.

Carl Pinto, Jr. is senior director of marketing communications for Bradford White.

Top water heating and storage manufacturer and trade organizations share concerns about aging blue-collar workforce.

Ambler, Pa. — As global economic disruption accelerates during the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, leaders in manufacturing, distribution and residential and commercial services are calling attention to overlooked career opportunities in the traditional skilled trades and urging an industry-wide focus on workforce development to close the skilled trades labor gap and recruit a new generation of young workers.

“For young people who are seeking a rewarding career but don’t feel like four years of college is the best choice for them, there are some tremendous advantages to seeking a career in the traditional skilled trades, from good starting salaries and job security to a variety of opportunities for advancement,” said Carl Pinto Jr., senior director of marketing communications, Bradford White Corporation.

“Unfortunately, many high school students and recent graduates who would thrive in our industry never consider a career in the trades. This is due in part to the overwhelming message that is being delivered through a variety of channels — college is the only path to success. But recent circumstances have highlighted the fact that manufacturing and residential and commercial service jobs are a critical part of the national economy. Lockdowns and social distancing have created challenges for the industry, but HVAC service and clean hot water have proven to be necessities during a pandemic. An overwhelming number of manufacturers and contractors were quickly identified as essential services and have been operating continuously since the COVID-19 outbreak began.”

Pinto and other experts share a concern about the demographics for manufacturing, distribution and skilled trades jobs.

“Everyone has a sweet spot in life and a unique path toward finding the career that best suits them,” said Rep. Tim Walberg of Michigan. “For some people this might mean pursuing a four-year degree, while for others an apprenticeship might be the answer. Whatever that path may be, it is critical that we look for innovative ways to provide educational opportunities for America’s workers and ensure our workforce is prepared for the good-paying jobs of the 21st century.”

According to the American Supply Association, approximately half of the people in those industries are at or nearing retirement age, but only 4% are under the age of 26.

“That’s our greatest concern, that there just aren’t enough people,” said ASA CEO Mike Adelizzi. “At the same time, we have to recognize that it’s an opportunity, too. With so many people aging out of the industry, a young worker can fast track his or her career.”

The ASA and other organizations are involved in ongoing efforts to combat stereotypes about blue-collar jobs. One of ASA’s key initiatives is the ASA Education Foundation, which provides innovative tools and strategies to support the preparation of the next generation of leaders and continued support for the next generation of the industry’s workforce.

“Our industry offers so much for young workers, but unfortunately there are some persistent stereotypes about manufacturing and trades jobs,” said PHCC Executive Vice President Michael R. Copp. “We feel a major responsibility to help our members reach and recruit the best talent. Connecting with the next generation of skilled trades workers not only helps individual businesses succeed, it elevates the industry as a whole.”

The Plumbing-Heating-Cooling Contractors—National Association (PHCC) has made workforce development a strategic priority and is developing a tool kit for its members and their suppliers. PHCC’s Workforce Development Center currently provides potential employees, manufacturers, contractors and suppliers with a library of online information and training material, with additional assets in the works.  In response to needs that arose during the pandemic, the PHCC Educational Foundation is leveraging its online learning platform to provide alternative methods to help contractors attract and train new employees.

To learn more about Bradford White, please visit https://www.bradfordwhitecorporation.com/