Phoenix Wood Products
Stan Redrick (l) and Phil Dexheimer (r) of Phoenix Wood Products accept their Sunshine State Safety Recognition Award.
Stan Redrick is safety director of Ocala's Phoenix Wood Products, one of the largest new pallet manufacturers in the Southeast. According to Redrick, it is a bad situation, when dealing with saws, nailing machines and other dangerous equipment, if you are not focused on safety as the No. 1 priority. But SHARP has helped Phoenix maintain that focus.
Redrick says the company felt it was doing a good job with safety when it first started pursuing SHARP certification. "It was a wake-up call for us to realize we were not even eligible for SHARP based on our accident frequency. Back then, a recordable accident was not that unusual. It wasn't that we ignored safety, but we didn't have our entire team on board."
It took the company several years to earn SHARP status, and Redrick says during that time and with a lot of work, safety became a priority. "Our accidents and near-misses dropped significantly, our employee-involvement increased significantly, and we saved a lot of money. Our workers' comp modifier went from a 1.0 to a .72. That's a 28% savings on workers' comp. That's not counting the savings we realized from reduced medical costs, loss time and light duty."
Workers' comp savings isn't the only number the company counts. This marks the company's third SHARP renewal. Its DART rate number also dropped from 5.1 in 2006 to 1.7 in 2008.
"We know that safety starts at the top. Once our managers were seen taking the safety lead, our employees proved that they could change their behavior towards safety. Our success is based on a strong safety commitment throughout the organization, from top management to line supervisors demonstrating and reinforcing our safety vision and goals."