Exclusive to Industrial Distribution/Viewpoint Column
Submitted 6/18/01

A New Safety Paradigm:
Personal Protection as a Business Advantage

By Beth Hoh
Manager, Marketing and R&D
Kimberly-Clark Safety Division
Alpharetta, Georgia

For years, safety suppliers have focused on technical performance (chemical barrier and physical properties) when selling personal protective apparel (PPA).
While such data will always be key PPA selling points, and while the health and safety of workers should always be the top priority, safety suppliers should consider a new paradigm for evaluating PPA. Instead of looking at PPA only as a necessary cost of doing business, help purchasers understand how PPA can help them create a competitive business advantage .

Absent from this paradigm is the "one material for any application" mentality, which compromises benefits like improving productivity, controlling costs, and enhancing a company’s image.

PPA as Productivity Improver
Keeping employees healthy and working is key to improving productivity. Thus, a protective garment must protect the worker from workplace hazards. This is where particle hold-out, chemical permeation and chemical penetration performance data apply. If the garment does not protect the worker, problems could result, impacting the work group’s productivity and worker’s compensation costs.

Assuming the garments your customers purchase protect appropriately (versus under or overprotecting) against workplace hazards, your customers should also consider how the garment’s comfort can affect productivity and safety. A garment’s breathability plays a role in heat stress and fatigue, which studies have shown affects a worker’s productivity.

Moreover, the garment’s comfort and breathability drives compliance with wearing protocols. If a garment is not comfortable and breathable, users may rip out airholes or not fasten the garment properly to minimize discomfort, thus compromising the protection the garment offers.

PPA as Cost Controller
Return on investment is compelling. Help your customers understand that they can protect their employees while meeting cost goals.

Ask your customers how many garments they toss away due to rip-outs. Garments designed to meet ANSI minimum sizing standards can rip when stress is applied to elbows, knees, crotch or seat. Seam and zipper failures are other frequent problems. If ten percent of garments purchased are unusable, the return on investment is less, even if the purchase price was lower than garments that exceed ANSI minimum sizing standards. Customers that understand this as a cost issue may be willing to pay more for garments that prevent rip-outs. In the process, worker safety and protection remain uncompromised.

Is the customer paying for protection they don’t need? Sometimes, apparel purchasers overprotect workers and overpay in the process. As a distributor, you can help your customers evaluate hazards within their workplace and then present fabric technologies and garment designs at various price points. While overprotection is preferable to underprotection, there are enough apparel options available that compromising on this point needn’t be an issue when controlling costs.

PPA as Image Enhancer
A company that cares for its employees by providing appropriate hazard protection and a comfortable working environment attracts the best employees, top tier customers and the public’s trust. Help your customers improve employee morale and well-being and lower costs associated with lost work time and worker’s comp insurance by showing them that one type of protective apparel fabric or garment is not right for every single application. In the process, you’ll help them enhance their image with employees, suppliers, customers and shareholders.