By: Briana Smith, WAXIE Sanitary Supply
First off, we’d like to thank everyone for all of their hard work organizing, setting up, and making sure that WAXIE Fest was a success. We’d also like to thank our customers for coming out to check on the all the latest products & innovations in the industry.
We know that sometimes it really helps to be able to see the products in person — to be able to compare a couple of different floor machines, carpet extractors, paper towel dispensers, chemical dilution systems or products, etc. all in one place at one time.
WAXIE’s bee even showed up and made some awesome dance moves as it made its way around the show.
To view photos of the event, check out the WAXIE Fest album on our Facebook or Google+ pages.
The Rubbermaid truck rolled into our Warehouse the day before the show with just inches to spare. They had many of their industrial, material handling & safety products on hand, as well as several of their new product lines including their Executive Series and Disposable Microfiber Mops & Cloths. Many ‘stations’ were set up so that you could move from one type of product line to another, and several Rubbermaid & WAXIE sales reps were on hand to assist customers with any questions they had. The inside of their truck featured an electronic information center. On one wall of the information area, one could walk up and check out the construction techniques of Rubbermaid’s Duramold technology up close, as well as seeing a variety of casters that are built for different uses.
WAXIE’s Education & Training department had a booth and gave a quick informational seminar on the newly launched online training program. Those who attended the seminar or stopped by their booth were shown the various features of the program from the different training modules with tips, videos, and step-by-step instructions to the knowledge checks and multiple-choice or true-false questions 10 quiz at the end of each module. Some cleaning procedures even included a ‘when to use what’ option, such as when to use an autoscrubber versus mopping. Safety procedures, inspecting one’s work, and clean up procedures are a specific focus & are mentioned in every training module. Currently available in English, a Spanish version of the online training program will soon be available in the first quarter of 2014.
Other vendors had great displays as well where attendees could walk up and check out new products. The Anderson Company showcased their personalized logo mats in several types of matting materials making it easy to envision how one’s own company logo could appear on a mat, welcoming people into their building or facility. And boy, can they be colorful! Crown Mats also had a very nice display on their matting system in a variety of colors, textures and type of mats. Mats Inc had a fun display, complete with Halloween treats.
Nearby, Georgia-Pacific displayed an array of their automatic enMotion dispensers in their booth, making it easy to get a good visual of what dispenser may work best in someone’s restrooms. A little bit further down was the Zep booth, which featured a nice selection of their industrial cleaners, and Fresh Wave IAQ with their great natural odor eliminator products. Ecolab had a selection of their QC Dispensing System products available, while Diversey had their Command Center system of products. So lots of choices!
American Paper Converting represented the WAXIE Clean & Soft lines of paper products & dispensers with a display showing how many wood chips it takes to produce a pack of multifold towels versus how much recycled paper it takes to produce a pack of the WAXIE-Green multifold towels. 3M’s booth featured their Scotchgard floor finishing system, as well as other industrial cleaning products and supplies.
Hand hygiene was the prominent focus at the Kimberly-Clark Professional booth, where attendees could find out more information on The Healthy Workplace Project*, The Healthy Schools Project* and the new Scott 24 Hour Sanitizing Spray. Remember to follow the protocol of HYGIENIFY! Wash, wipe, sanitize when washing your hands to break the transmission of germs! As you can see, we were having fun.
Heritage Bag had great information on WAXIE’s DuraStar & KleenLine trash can liners, as well as a prize wheel. A few of the prizes that someone could win included lip balm, a hat or a briefcase. Across from their booth was the BigBelly Solar Compactors, which make trash collection & recycling much easier and efficient. The WAXIE bee even demonstrated the proper technique!
Windsor had some of their more popular machine models, including the Chariot, out and available for test drives. The chrome on one of NSS’ floor machines was super shiny! Advance had quite a large selection of their product line for attendees to check out, including ride on and walk-behind autoscrubbers. ProTeam & Workshop were represented as well, next to Unger’s window cleaning equipment. WAXIE even had a Demo Equipment Blowout Sale near the front, for those looking for a great deal. We also have several rentals available in our Service Center, as well as leasing options for all machines.
The hospitality booth was nice & refreshing with a variety of sample amenities. This was one of the more popular booths, as people seemed excited to test out samples of Vervé & Ecossential Spa lines of products.
Last up, but not least, was the WAXIE Solution Station, Floor Care, Bioactive Maintenance Products & WAXIE-Green Premeasured Packets booths where attendees could check out some of WAXIE’s most popular cleaning products. Several good questions were asked as people were looking at the WAXIE-Green line of Solution Station products, including why there wasn’t a disinfectant amongst the options. Disinfectants cannot be classified as “green” products, as the nature of a disinfectant is to kill viruses & bacterial. So currently, no disinfect can be third-party certified as a “green” disinfectant. For more information, you may want to read “Green and “Disinfect” – Do They Go Together?
Other vendors showing products included:AEP, Bobrick, Clorox, Diamond Wipes, Diplomat Coffee, Havells Lighting, Panasonic, Vapor Tec, World Dryer and Golden Gate Paper.
No festival can be complete without some fun games & prizes. Attendees could try their hand at several carnival games, such as: glass bottle ring toss, hit the milk bottles with a baseball, shoot some hoops, and mini one-hole golf. There were over 200 prize winners. Then came the raffle prizes by the Rubbermaid truck as the lunch buffet was wrapping up. Prizes included three TVs, an ipad, cameras, gift cards, a blueray disc player, a Samsung tablet, a color Nook and a two night vacation package to Morongo Casino. The vacation package to Morongo Casino consisted of a two night stay, golf, dinner for both days and spa gift certificate. Woohoo!
Hope that everyone had fun learning about new products, or old favorites that they forgot about. Let us know if there are any questions you still have on any products, the Online Training Program or anything else. We’d be happy to help. It was great getting a chance to see everyone and talk about what concerns you have with cleaning, supplying, training, etc.
Also, a huge shout-out to Jim with Antelope Valley School District for his 35+ years cleaning experience. It was great talking with you about drains, mops and cleaning supplies at the WAXIE Solution Station products booth!