MEMORIAL DAY

Confer Plastics will be closed Saturday, May 25th through Monday, May 27th in observance of the Memorial Day weekend. Enjoy the unofficial start of summer with your families (the weather looks perfect in WNY) and please take the time to reflect on the true meaning of Memorial Day.

BOB CONFER APPEARS ON LOCAL EDUCATION SHOW

Yesterday, our vice-president Bob Confer was the guest of BOCES Board of Education President Becky Albright and Anedda Trautman, the Principal of Niagara Career and Technical Education Center, for a filming of an episode of "Your Public Schools".

If you are a parent of a teenager or young adult who might be wondering about what to do with their lives, tune in to Time Warner Cable channel 21 in the Niagara/Buffalo market for some answers as Bob, Becky, and Anedda talk about the importance of skilled trades and vocational training.

The show will air repeatedly over the next 4 weeks. You can see LCTV's schedule at www.LCTV.net

WATCH THE TARGET SUCCESS VIDEO ABOUT CONFER PLASTICS

In 2008, our vice-president Bob Confer appeared on an episode of "Target Success", a locally-produced business & education related show that runs on Time Warner cable in Western New York. Bob talked about the company with host Jerry Wolfgang and it makes for an excellent primer about Confer Plastics. The show is a half-hour in length and is divided in 2 videos below...

ASSEMBLY VIDEOS FOR CURVE SYSTEM

We have posted online 2 videos detailing the assembly of our complete Curve System, the attractive "wedding cake" style steps for swimming pools....

 

WHY FUNDRAISER ITEMS ARE PICKED UP AT OUR WAREHOSE

Yesterday, a really miserable woman who won one of our patio sets in a local fundraiser/benefit gave our staff a hard time on the phone (and dropped "F" bombs) because she was "inconvenienced" by having to pick up her FREE (and expensive) patio set.

For anyone -- like her -- who wonders why we have the sets picked up at our warehouse and don't have them available at the fundraisers, it's simple: The boxes are so large that we can't have the product at a fundraiser for space reasons within the fire hall, church, or wherever it may be held...and the coordinators of that event cannot count on the winner having enough room in his or her car the night of the event.

As for anyone who relies on our products for their fundraiser: Fear not, one bad person doesn't ruin it for everyone else. People like her are a small part of the population and the good people (and the good that we can do with our donations) can far outweigh the bad.

CONFER PLASTICS' POLICY ON MANAGEMENT'S ACCESSIBILITY BY PHONE, E-MAIL

Some of our clients may find it confusing, even frustrating, that we don’t allow for our management team’s cell phone numbers to be shared with them. They are equally confounded by our lack of company-supplied smart phones, personal data assistants, and laptops. 

It has been a long-held company policy that we don’t divulge cell phone numbers or equip our staff with the latest in portable technology because we firmly believe that “family” is a big part of “family business”.  There is a clear division in our company philosophy -- and demands -- between home and work, and, when the day is done, we expect our coworkers to spend time with their families. 

We do not condone after-hours communication with our customers because it is exactly that: after hours. Our managers and owners spend 8 to 11 hours (and maybe more) of their days in the office or in the plant; that is where they do their work. A good portion of our management team starts their days by – and even well before – 7:00 a.m. (we do, after all, produce goods 24 hours a day). We don’t want them to take their work home with them because quality of life is contingent on a good job and it’s also contingent on a life outside of that job.

Our policy applies to our team’s evenings, weekends, holidays, and vacations. As a matter of fact, we also demand that our personnel do not call our suppliers outside of their working hours, either – we value their personal time as much as ours.

This policy may not seem like it keeps with the times, now that we live in a 24-hour world. But, that constant connectedness from phones, Blackberries and the like is maybe a dozen years old. The business world did just fine before that. And, it will be just fine when that technology goes the way of the telegraph.

But, please don’t think that this means your business isn’t worth our efforts or attention. We still focus on service, delivery, and quality just as have for more than 40 years. Our staff will answer your phone calls and emails during our working hours and from the office. It might not be that immediate response that you may have come to expect from the rest of Corporate America, but the ultimate outcome will be what you have always expected – and what we always expect – from Confer Plastics: top-notch results.

Thank you for your understanding.

Bob Confer

Vice-President