What's in a name?

Northeast Wholesale Nail & Fastener Supply rarely, if ever, gets credit when the right nail or tool makes its way to a jobsite—and it likes it that way!

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What's in a name? #1
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Canton, MA
— "Our No. 1 goal is to make our customers more valuable to their customers," says Irving Hurwitz, founder of Northeast Wholesale Nail & Fastener Supply (NEW). "We're here to help them 'sell' their name."
NEW is a distributorship in the traditional two-step sense. It wholesales its product line to a long list of customers throughout New England and the Northeastern states. Customers who, in turn, sell to contractors, builders and other end-users. There are no direct to consumer sales, and no plans to ever go that route.
"In our situation, a lumber yard or tool house in the Northeast doesn't support a wholesale/retail type of distributor. It's almost impossible to wear two hats," Irving explains. "That's not a great revelation, or a new business model, it's just the way things are done in this part of the country."
"We give 100 percent of our support to the lumber yards and tool houses, dealing just with them and assisting them in support of their customers," adds John Hurwitz, Irving's youngest son who's head of operations. "We don't ever want to even appear to be in competition to them. We work hard to build their business, and that builds our business."
"Our customers are selling windows, doors and roofing to contractors every day," interjects Rick Hurwitz, head of sales and Irving's oldest son. "So, it's natural for them to be selling fasteners and tools. Their customers need them, and they're doing business there already so it just makes sense. We work with lumber yards to get them better prices and to make their names important among their customer contractors."
Customized for each customer
The term "private label" takes on a significantly more important meaning at NEW than in most operations. Here, everything that goes out the door is customized for the company that will eventually deliver it to a jobsite.
For example, working with its suppliers, NEW has developed a detailed program of color coding for various nails coming into the warehouse. Each box, tub or carton is coded to the same color so an appropriate custom label can be applied — galvanized nails come in a green box and get green labels and so on.
"Rick came up with the idea for the private labeling program almost eight years ago," Irving recalls. "He came back with ideas he'd heard from customers and we decided that anything we could do to make it easier for the contractor to buy, and make sure the right products were getting out there for the right job would benefit us, too."
"We, as a company, wanted to separate ourselves from the competition, just like our customers," Rick explains. "All our competition was out there with nails, screws and collated fasteners. They all had a 'here's our program, you'll love it,' marketing approach.
"We were able to differentiate ourselves by going to customers and saying, 'tell us what you need, what you want, and we'll create it specifically for you.' They didn't have to fit something we had, we designed everything to fit them."
The custom label program has been tailored to lumber yard and tool house customers, making it easier for them to communicate with their customers and prospects.
Taking the concept a step further, the family developed a color coding program that is implemented within customers' stores so salespeople and contractors can easily find what they need. "If a customer comes in with a box or label, the salesperson knows exactly what they need, and customers can recognize what they need without knowing specific brands, makes or models," Irving explains.
"We've gone so far as to place pictures of the nails on labels so a customer can walk in, see the image and say, 'that's exactly what I need.' Nobody even has to open a box to know it's the right product," John adds. "On every NEW box there's a tool chart, too, so if, for example, a customer isn't sure if the contents will work with his specific nail gun, he can check the chart for specific model numbers and photos of the various tools that fit. He can quickly realize 'that's the one I need,' just by checking the box. Everything we do is planned to make it easier to move product on behalf of our customers."
Marketing, promotion to a new level
The customization programs have brought the basic packaging for nails or screws into the realm of marketing and promotion. "It's free advertising and free promotion with the company's name, address, hours, phone numbers and even a special message on every label going out the door," Irving says. "We've had people come back saying, 'We sent an order to a job and had three people come back to us because they saw our name on a box…now we have three new customers.' So we know it works."
"It's like leaving an oversized calling card with everything you deliver to every jobsite," Rick adds.
With more than 800 customers in its custom label database, the company has come a long way since deciding it might have found a way to be a little different. The program started with one label printer limited to simple black ink. Today, there's a staff of three specialists working with images and multiple colors on a daily basis.
"Almost every day we get a request from a customer for something new or something special," Rick points out. "We can use photos of a new store, go to a company website and grab a logo or pictures, almost anything. Our people work with customers to create new designs, special messages and all the details. Then we handle proofing and approvals before printing what they need. Working with 800 customers keeps us busy."
The company's roster of clients shapes up as about 85 percent lumber yards and about 15 percent what they call "STAFDA-style" tool houses. "In this region, lumber yards are strong when it comes to carrying and selling nails — partly because we have made it so easy and efficient for them — because that's been the way to do business for years. Our business works out to be 85 percent to 15 percent because that's about the ratio of what's out there — more lumber yards selling nails and tools than dedicated tool outlets," Irving explains.
And, he should know. Irving, his wife Rosland, and Rick started the business in 1990, so they've had nearly 18 years to study the marketplace. Always in the general Boston area, the company moved as it expanded — from 5,000 square feet to 10,000 square feet, then to 25,000 square feet and 30,000 square feet until moving into its present 85,000-square-foot location in Canton. "We held onto our 30,000-square-foot warehouse in Randolph, MA, and that was a wise move, we're already starting to feel pinched a little, here," John grins.
Small, but committed
The new company was small, but committed to personal service. As the business expanded so did the line card, but the commitment has always been to fasteners and fastener technology. To this day, the company is selective in the lines it carries. Specialty items like GRK screws, Spit Top screws, Ramset fasteners, Ironclad gloves, Sola levels and Fomo brand products are all items designed to help dealers become more specialized to the contractor.
"We have been fortunate in that our customer base grew rapidly so we could attract more product lines," Irving adds. And, another stroke of good fortune was our ability to align ourselves with several key buying groups here in the Northeast."
"Among the most influential buying groups are LMC, ENAP and Philadelphia Reserve. These organizations promote vendors to their members that the view as providing value value in products and service. We work closely with members of these groups. Our goal is to help them grow their business.
"These buying groups have their customer base and that base attends their shows and events," John adds. "We have been able to become a part of those events, too, as well as selling shows for our customers and their contractors. Anything that helps build their business, builds ours."
"In many cases there are two kinds of products, the things contractors will price out because they buy so many of them — like roofing nails—and the kinds of things where packaging and delivery are issues," Rick continues. "And, there are products where a contractor just says, 'have it for me when I need it, and get me a good price.' We're trying to make both those sales as easy as possible."
Buying groups have proven to have loyal followings built on long-time relationships and these relationships have been real door-openers for NEW. "Our unique, private label program that really builds the brand of the group's members has made us valuable to them, too," Rick points out. "We've helped their members build identities that set them apart from the Big Box stores and other lumber yards."
As successes in the field become documented, more and more vendors have recognized the potential and offered to "come on board." "Hardly a day goes by that we aren't approached by a company that wants us to represent them in this area," John acknowledges. But we continue to be very selective."
One locally strong manufacturer has become a major player in recent growth, however. "We're fastener people. That's what our sales guys know and that's what they specialize in. We know nails. So, we have long recognized our need to have a highly respected, dependable line of tools and fasteners to complement our package nail and screw programs. Bostitch has stepped up and played a huge role in our growth in the last year."
"It took us almost four years to get them on the team," Irving recounts, "but we wanted them because they are the dominant line in the industry. It's very important that we be connected to a line with credibility in our marketplace. We have other excellent lines, but Bostitch is clearly the contractor's choice in pneumatics.
"Ours has been a wonderful marriage and we've proven to have the right mix of products and sales support — we have 11 fulltime sales people — and this arrangement has helped both of us grow our sales in a down market. While many people are seeing sales off as much as 40 percent, ours are going the other way."
One of the reasons this combination has been successful, according to the NEW team, is the fact that most customers are set up with what amounts to a guaranteed sale program. "They know that, for whatever reason, if something doesn't move in their store that we will take it back—no service charges, no hidden costs. That gives them the freedom to try some new things with less risk," Irving explains.
"We took on a tool once that was guaranteed to be a 'home run.' Far from it, we took back 200 of them and gave dealers full credit. The word on that got out, and while it hurt us here for a while, it did our reputation a lot of good," John recalls.
The bottom line
The construction-based economy in the Northeast, like elsewhere, has taken a chunk from the bottom line of most related businesses. Lumber yards, according to the NEW leadership, is especially down because of close ties to residential housing construction. "That's why getting their name onto jobsites as often as possible is so critically important, and why our private labeling is really helping many of them," Rick says. "This past year, more than any other, we're finding that contractors are bringing tools in to be repaired and not buying new — no matter how good the deals appear to be. That's a good indication of how the economy is affecting them.
"Our private label program allows lumber yards and tool houses to get their name out there in front of a lot of people without a lot of effort or extra cost," he adds. "It's like fishing: if you don't put your bait out there, you can't catch anything. When it's there, you never know what you might pull in.
"We know it works, too. We were in a yard we'd done some business with and were explaining the labeling program," he continues, "the would-be customer saw the labels and said, 'We saw Malloney's nails on a jobsite, and now we know where he got them!' That's a great testimonial."
Northeast Wholesale Nail & Fastener Supply at a glance
Founded: 1990
Ownership: Irving Hurwitz, CEO; Richard Hurwitz, president of sales; John Hurwitz, president of operations
Key individuals: Scott DeTerra, CFO; James Stewart, vice president of purchasing and operations
Headquarters: 980 Turnpike Street, Canton MA 02021
Facility: 85,000 square feet
Employees: 48
Key markets: Lumber yards and tool/fastener distributors in Massachusetts, Maine, Vermont, New Hampshire, Connecticut, Rhode Island, Pennsylvania, New York, New Jersey, Delaware and Maryland
Computer technology: Mas200, privatized labeling software, integrated faxing software
Associations/Affiliations: LMC, ENAP, STAFDA, ACE, True Serve
Lead lines: Bostitch, Ironclad, DeWalt, Ramset, Splitstop, GRK,FOMO, Porter Cable, Rol Air, PAM, Interchange, Falcon, Spotnail, Radians, Excalibur, Red Head Tapcon, AirKnife
Website: www.newnail.com
A great idea grows into a fulltime commitment
When Northeast Wholesale Nail & Fastener Supply (NEW) decided it could differentiate itself from its competitors by offering customers personalized, custom labels and unique color-coded packaging ,its leadership team had no idea how the concept would take off. It has evolved from one black and white printer in a back room to a complete staff working with a client list of more than 800 lumber yards and tool houses. This staff design, creates and generates more than customer-oriented labels. It creates custom marketing pieces that have helped NEW clients grow their business when others are struggling. Today, labels can include photos, advertising messages and promotions in addition to the usual name, address and phone number.
"A box of nails left on a jobsite becomes a personalized calling card for the supplier," explains Rick Hurwitz, who came up with the private labeling plan almost eight years ago.
author: By A. D. "Butch" Horn




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