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PHOTOS BY MIKE DeFILIPPO
BEST PRACTICES STORY BY A. LEE CHICHESTER
CHANGE
FROM
AT FLORENCE, KENTUCKYBASED WISEWAY SUPPLY,
INTERNAL RESTRUCTURING
IS REFLECTED BY AN
EXTERNAL REBRANDING
CAMPAIGN.
hirty-five years ago, Biz and
Jackie Cain founded Wiseway
Supply, efficiently serving a residential builders’ marketplace that
needed plumbing and electrical
supplies, home lighting fixtures,
kitchen cabinets, and appliances. The
service area was primarily Florence, Ky.
Both Wiseway and the marketplace
have evolved since that time. The building
market has become more commercial,
and Wiseway has grown—under the
leadership of Biz and Jackie’s sons, John
Cain, president, and Charlie Cain, senior
vice president—to five branches (including a lighting showroom and a corporate
headquarters). Still, outsiders’ perception
of the company remained unchanged.
To change this, Wiseway’s principals
took control of the way the company is
perceived by undertaking an internal restructuring that is reflected by an external
rebranding campaign—all of which is
more than just a simple logo redesign. The
company has developed communications
tools to tell the world that it’s family owned,
professionally managed, progressive, and
energetic—and that its 35 years of “knowhow” translates into “can-do” for customers and vendors.
“Outsiders will form an opinion of your
company,” said John Cain. “You can let
T
Wiseway Supply’s John Cain (left), president, and Charlie Cain, senior vice president, headed
up the efforts to create a consistent counter look as part of a rebranding initiative.
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yourself be branded, or you can do the
branding yourself.”
Starting on the inside
At the suggestion of management consultant Diane Egbers of Leadership Excelleration, the Cains began developing and
assembling a leadership team that would
spread the decision-making responsibilities among professionals drawn from both
the company and the industry.
“Charlie and I felt that there weren’t
enough hours in the day for the two of us
to be wearing all of the hats in this
growing company,” said John Cain. “We’d
been the primary engines behind the
growth of the company until that point—
but we didn’t want to become the ones
that were holding it back.”
Among those chosen to redistribute
leadership responsibilities were 11-year
veteran of the company Marianne Brummett, director of marketing, and Tim Fries,
vice president of sales and marketing.
“I didn’t know a thing about Wiseway
when John first approached me,” said
Fries. “So I asked around, and what I
heard from the outside was that the company was perceived as a small, familycontrolled, residential organization. Some
people knew Wiseway only as an electrical supplier, while others knew it as
strictly plumbing oriented. I went back to
John and met more of the Wiseway
leadership, and saw a group of dynamic,
energetic, future-oriented, and progressive people. The two perceptions didn’t
match up: Wiseway was going places—
but everyone thought it was the same as it
had been 30 years ago. We initiated a
process to change that.”
In addition to building a professional
management team, structural changes
outlined in the strategic plan included
moving the corporate offices into a newly
refurbished headquarters building in
March, pushing the inside sales functions
down to the branch levels so they’d be
closer to their customers, and updating
each branch counter area to be consistent in look, lighting, and location of material. In several cases, new branch buildings were required.
“We’ve found that the look of our facilities is important in our effort to convey the
scope of Wiseway,” said Brummett. “Consistency of appearance goes a long way
toward conveying a professional attitude.”
Continued on page 32
Wiseway Supply’s new company logo is displayed on the sign and building located at the front
of the distributor’s Florence, Ky., branch, and on the company’s new fleet of trucks.
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Along with ease of access, arrangement of material was critical so that neither
electrical nor plumbing contractors would
feel neglected by the company. Today,
the leadership includes specialty managers for each division, giving each sector
professional oversight. Also, the commercial quotations division has been consolidated into the corporate offices, and the
company’s unique ability to offer both
electrical and plumbing is being leveraged
into a new focus on MRO clientele—again,
with the hiring of an experienced professional to oversee that aspect exclusively.
“Know-how” meets “can-do”
Once the internal foundations had been
renovated, Wiseway’s leadership put into
place a strategic marketing plan to develop tools to communicate the reality of
the company into the wider marketplace,
including their vendors.
The team looked outside of the organization for help. “We felt we were just too
close to the trees to see the forest,” said
Charlie Cain. “I think Tim and Marianne are
perfectly capable in this regard, but we
needed an objective viewpoint.”
So Wiseway hired Marcia McMillen,
president of McMillen Creative, a consulting firm specializing in branding. “I started
by researching the actual opinions and
perceptions of the company’s existing
customer base,” she recalled. “I asked not
only what they envisioned Wiseway as
being able to provide, but also what the
company wasn’t providing to serve their
needs. Knowing what your weaknesses
are is as important as knowing your
strengths and opportunities. The final
piece is understanding the competition.
“In some branding processes,” she
continued, “the management looked at the
company and decided it should be this or
that—without looking around to see what
services were already being provided,
who was growing fastest and why, and
who was moving into the area. In my
experience, that’s not going to be a successful approach.”
McMillen discovered that the company’s existing marketing tools weren’t
bridging the gap between what it really did
in the marketplace and what it was perceived as being able to do.
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Marianne Brummett,
director of marketing
The new branding is quite visible—as seen here in the waiting area, and above in signage.
“A brand is a bridge that you design
and construct to span that gap,” said John
Cain. “It’s always evolving as the company
and the needs of the marketplace grow
and change.”
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“Even our own people had their various
perceptions of what Wiseway was, depending on which branch they worked at
and the types of customers they served,”
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noted Charlie Cain. “There wasn’t a unified
message being communicated, and that
was mostly because we had not shaped
the message.”
With her research, McMillen has found
that Wiseway’s long-time customers appreciate not only the 35-year legacy of
local marketplace knowledge, but also the
agility and a youthful “can-do” attitude not
found in enormous multinationals. Managers adopted this as the company tagline and began building the com munications tools around it. Together, they
considered a new look; key written messages, new line cards, and a corporate
packet designed to convey diversity, professionalism, and energy.
“The brand has to come organically,
from inside the company,” said McMillen.
“It has to be expressed outward with consistency and excitement, and always in
the same key. The marketing materials we
create aren’t the brand—those support the
brand. For a brand to be successful, everyone using it has to be completely comfortable with it, from the managers straight
through to the truck drivers.”
“This isn’t something we’ll accomplish
in one day,” noted Fries. “While we continue to evaluate how closely we have
achieved our goals in terms of communicating our brand, we will constantly be
flexing it to fit the new realities we expect
to achieve into the future.”
“This doesn’t mean we’ve abandoned
our past,” added John Cain. “We’re very
proud of our history and our legacy. Our
past is literally the foundation upon which
we’re building everything else—this is a
construction process, not a tearing-down
of anything.”
Once the branding tools were de veloped, the company threw a party to
introduce the new communications tools to
employees. Excitement, buy-in, and energy percolated throughout the staff as the
new internal structures received an external representation that was as professional as the company’s employees felt.
Many customers, vendors, neighbors,
and even competitors were impressed
when the signs, trucks, letterhead, invoices, counter areas, and logo wear hit
the street earlier this year. Long-time customers appreciated the new look, but they
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basically knew the best-kept secret in all of
the company’s capabilities already.
LaShele Montfort was once a pur chasing manager for a potential Wiseway
customer. “You can never take back that
first impression,” she said. “I was a customer to a lot of outside salespeople, including Wiseway. The company’s old materials didn’t tell me much about them and
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would go into the stack piled on my desk.
Even though the salesperson was very
good, I had a million things on my mind,
and the materials he left behind were not
all that impressive.
“After the introduction of the new look, I
said, ‘Wow. This company has its act
together,’” she continued. “It got my atContinued on page 36
Tim Fries, vice
president of sales
and marketing
BEYOND LETTERHEAD
Providing value to vendors is a key focus at Wiseway Supply. “Keep in mind that
effectively communicating your brand to the marketplace cannot only be a
recruitment strategy for customers and employees—but for vendors as well,”
noted Tim Fries, vice president of sales and marketing. “The tools we’ve
developed are hands-on representations of the fact that behind them we have a
strategic marketing plan with specific steps we’ll follow to reach measurable
goals. That kind of preparation demonstrates to vendors that we can be a full
partner in their own marketing goals.”
Planning marketing strategies, setting goals, and becoming functional
partners with vendors should be critical aspects of the rebranding process. “I’m a
firm believer in setting common goals and working together to achieve them,”
said Mike Altomare, vice president of Hubbell Lighting. “The more distributors
can work with manufacturers to define what the value is and how you’re going to
deliver it, the more successful both parties will be.”
“In the past, our impression was that Wiseway did not share our goals. But
that’s changed,” said John Born, midcentral district sales manager for Leviton
Manufacturing. “Their last presentation to us in the buying group meeting was
impressive. Not only was the new look refreshing, but the professionalism of the
delivery of their message sent a positive signal to our regional vice president. He
told me this was one of the best customer presentations he’d ever attended.
“We wish more distributors would do their homework like Wiseway,” Born
continued. “Distributors need to know not only what their own placement and
direction in the marketplace is, but also the position and needs of their manufacturer partners. With a partnership like what we enjoy with Wiseway, we achieved
double-digit growth last year—exceeding our expectations for the area.”—A.L.C.
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tention and made a good impression because it communicated the scope of what
Wiseway is capable of. I remember thinking, ‘I don’t want to be left out of this.’”
The new look will become the old look,
however, with time and exposure. This is
why Wiseway stresses that the brand is
more than a line card, letterhead, or a
logo. Professionalism is also communicated via infrastructure. “The new headquarters reflects Wiseway’s growth and
the new image they’re greeting their
vendors with,” said Mark Altomare, vice
president of Hubbell Lighting. “The difference in perception between meeting in
their showroom and in the new conference
room is very important to us, and helps
demonstrate Wiseway’s commitment to
our goals and needs.”
Why Wiseway?
Several of the newest recruits to the
company from outside tell stories about a
dawning recognition of Wiseway as an
exciting company to work for. “As I was
considering this move, friends would ask
me, ‘Wiseway? Why Wiseway?’” said
Randy Van Huss, outside sales, electric
division. “It was that separation between
what was really happening here—which
was dynamic, exciting, and progressive—
and what outsiders saw. I had to explain to
a lot of people what the reality was.”
As a recruitment tool, the rebranding
process has generated excitement and
curiosity among industry insiders. “I wondered why I hadn’t heard of the energy of
this company before,” said Montfort. “As I
was thinking about joining the excitement,
I met this or that person, and said to
myself, ‘It’s just this individual who’s really
dynamic.’ And then I’d meet another one.
And another. Everyone here is really energized and motivated. I came right on
board because it was so exciting.”
One of John Cain’s primary goals in
renovating his company’s perception in the
world was to ensure that his people were
proud of their involvement with Wiseway.
From the inside, employees have always
known how great it is to be a part of the
organization—but where would their reality
collide with outsiders’ perceptions? This
was one of the main reasons that the
Wiseway management team knew the
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A sales training session takes
place in the company’s Florence, Ky., headquarters.
existing branding bridge wasn’t doing its
job. The employees shouldn’t have to
explain, “Why Wiseway?”
“Our employees have become so
excited to be a part of this organization,”
said Brummett. “From the new corporate
headquarters to the new paint on the
trucks—everyone has felt a significant
burst of pride. They see the new management team in place and they see changes
in how we do business and how we communicate our business to the world. Energy levels are sky high.”
“This business is truly how you treat
people,” noted Fries. “We’ve set specific
internal goals and everyone knows they’ll
be held accountable to help attain them—
everyone has a road map to our future and
we know exactly how we’ll get there.
People appreciate that and are excited
about participating in that process.”
It’s important to have substance to
back any new look. For Wiseway, it’s not
just a trial balloon inflated and floated over
the marketplace—”know-how” really must
meet “can-do” for a branding effort to be
successful. “We can point to the fact that
we’re doing something right when we’re
hearing feedback in the marketplace,”
said Fries. “I don’t think we would hear that
feedback if we weren’t doing something
exciting or new in the market.”
“I’ve worked with other companies that
have not done their homework,” said
McMillen. “They don’t know what they are,
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or don’t know what they want to be in their
marketplace. Wiseway began with a marketing plan; it knew its position in the
marketplace and how to draw on those
competitive advantages. This told my
team how best to differentiate Wiseway
from its competition. With the marketing
plan, we had a road map to develop the
brand—they’d targeted specific goals and
detailed steps to reach them. If the company hadn’t been fully behind the strategy,
then it would have been no more than
smoke and mirrors.”
“A brand is the vehicle that will convey
your company’s future,” said John Cain. “A
logo redesign is an expense—a rebranding process is an investment.” ■ ■ ■
Chichester can be reached online at
falconer@swva.net.
AT A GLANCE
Headquarters: Florence, Ky.
Trading Market: Greater Cincinnati
Year Established: 1972
Principals: John Cain, president, and
Charlie Cain, senior vice president
Locations: Florence, Ky.; Dry Ridge,
Ky.; Loveland, Ohio; Monroe, Ohio;
and Harrison, Ohio
Employees: 108
Affiliations: IMARK, NAED, WIT,
HBA, ASA
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