Factories around the country require overtime to meet demand for portable generators spawned by Charley and Frances.
By KRIS HUNDLEY
Published September 14, 2004
Kearney, Neb., may be more than 1,000 miles from Florida, but hundreds of its residents are feeling the impact of this summer's string of hurricanes.
At the Coleman Powermate plant in Kearney, 300 workers are pulling mandatory 10-hour shifts, six days a week, assembling portable generators for tens of thousands of Florida homeowners whose power has been knocked out by hurricane winds. Or might be next time.
Though Coleman Powermate, until recently part of the conglomerate that owns Coleman camping gear, typically stashes some inventory in preparation for tropical storm season, Hurricane Charley a month ago pretty much depleted that surplus.
Home Depot, one of the manufacturer's major retail customers, had 30,000 Coleman portable generators in its stores in the Ft. Myers area four days before Charley struck. They sold out within days and demand has exceeded supply ever since.
"Generators are going onto trucks as soon as they come off the production line," said Don Harrison, a spokesman for Home Depot, which sells Coleman, Honda and Generac portable generators. "I've seen them being sold with not a speck of dust on the box."
Lowe's, which sells Briggs & Stratton generators under the Troy-Bilt label, said it sold 40,000 home backup units in Florida in the past month. Replenishments are arriving at the rate of 750 units, or three truckloads, a day.
Portable power generators, which retail for $400 and up, are used by campers in the wilderness, vendors at street fairs and desperate homeowners when the power fails. There were about 500,000 portable generators sold in 2002, for total revenue of $489.3-million, according to a survey by New York City consultants Frost & Sullivan. Coleman Powermate and Briggs & Stratton are the leading sellers in the residential market.
While hurricanes might seem to bring financial windfalls to the handful of generator manufacturers, the storms also bring their share of strain and expense.
Briggs & Stratton Power Products Group has its factory in Jefferson, Wis., running two shifts to try to keep up with demand. Even so, its efforts are hampered by delays in certain components like alternators from other parts of the world.
Coleman Powermate has had to airfreight parts from suppliers in other states, as well as overseas, at added cost to keep its assembly line supplied.
A Coleman Powermate plant in Springfield, Minn., which usually builds air compressors and pressure washers has converted one line to portable generators. And a vanload of workers from Springfield has temporarily relocated to Kearney, about three hours west of Omaha, to help those employees keep up their breakneck pace.
The plant in Kearney, a town of 30,000, also recently held a job fair to attract new workers. Though Coleman Powermate declines to disclose production figures, the plant is reportedly making 40 percent more portable generators today than it did two years ago. Average time to assemble a 5,000-watt generator capable of powering essential domestic needs like a refrigerator and lights: about one day.
Tom Beyer is president and chief executive of Coleman Powermate, which was acquired in August by Sun Capital Partners of Boca Raton. He said a month since Charley gutted Florida - and his company's inventory backlog - his workers are firmly entrenched in storm mode.
"I've never seen anything like it," said Beyer, who has been with the Aurora, Ill., company, formerly part of American Household Inc., for two years. "It's the same attitude people have when they're filling sand bags to keep the banks of the Mississippi River from flooding. They're doing everything they can to contribute."
Beyer's plant in Kearney is now on nearly a round-the-clock schedule, with parts and maintenance crews working Sundays, scrambling to keep up with the assembly line. His salespeople are on the phone with major customers almost hourly, tracking shipments into disaster areas and diverting them from elsewhere.
And when the trucks leave the Kearney plant, they're equipped with two drivers to ensure delivery to stores as quickly as possible.
"It's a pretty expensive way to move product," said Beyer, who is competing with overworked utility crews to meet homeowners' needs. "But we're providing a product to people who have the need now. It might bring some comfort. And everybody has a relative in Florida."
In addition to revving up productivity in its factories when hurricanes hit, Coleman Powermate sends teams of repair workers to the hardest-hit areas to provide free service on its generators.
After Charley, the company had six employees offering help at retailers in Sarasota, Port Charlotte and Venice. Following Frances, seven Coleman Powermate workers were in Palm Beach County, Vero Beach, Stuart and Ft. Pierce. That team returned to Nebraska yesterday, but are standing by to return after Ivan's landfall.
In addition to fostering goodwill for the Coleman Powermate brand, the company's storm team helps retailers deal with angry customers - both while the power is out and when it comes back on.
"We help ward off returns," said manager of product service Mike Smith, who said customers will sometimes try to turn in a generator as nonfunctioning when the emergency has passed. "We'll fix it for them so stores aren't stuck with a generator that's perfectly good. We want to help them sell as much as possible."
