Coping with COVID-19: Windmoeller & Hoelscher Corp.

LINCOLN – Windmoeller & Hoelscher Corp. President Andrew Wheeler’s perspective on the COVID-19 pandemic is through the lens of a cancer survivor.

“I think everyone has been personally impacted by the virus,” said Wheeler. “I’m not particularly nervous at this time, but that is a simple matter of timing. Had this been happening 12 months ago when I was finishing chemotherapy and radiation treatments, my family and I would have been very concerned. Perhaps being a cancer survivor has changed how I process crises. One thing I can say, however, is that I have been incredibly inspired watching how people around the world have collectively adapted to this new, hopefully temporary reality.”

His business, meanwhile, continues to operate, delivering machinery to companies that produce packaging for food, hygiene and medical products. Wheeler said about half of his 63 employees normally work remotely in tech support in the field. About 70% of the rest of his staff is now working from home.

Wheeler said a new remote technology the company has employed solves about 80% of its machine issues remotely. “A service we’re offering our customers now is called Visual Assistance. It is an app which lets a technician, who under normal circumstances would be able to travel to a customer’s plant, view the external working environment of a machine through an operator’s smartphone.”

- Advertisement -

PBN is asking local business owners and CEOs five questions in a survey designed to understand how the new coronavirus has affected them and their businesses and what they have learned from the unprecedented challenges. Here are Wheeler’s responses:

1. How are you coping amid the COVID-19 crisis?

I think we are coping extremely well given the circumstances. At Windmoeller & Hoelscher, we are the North American arm of our German parent company, with full support staff and parts inventory for our customer base, who predominantly manufacture packaging for the food, hygiene and medical markets. Right now, our customers are busy keeping up with demands from the pandemic, which means we need to be accessible 24/7 to make sure their machinery is up and running and able to produce the goods that the country needs. This includes sending spare parts out from our warehouse in Lincoln. We are incredibly lucky to be in a busy industry, which takes away the heart-wrenching pressure of needing to cut staff or cut hours and we are very thankful for that.

Our challenge has been two-fold: (1) How to keep our employees healthy and safe while being able to work at the company, from their home office or in a customer’s plant. (2) How to provide customers with on-site technician visits and the immediate service they need when there are travel restrictions and also limited travel options.

2. Have you found silver linings in these difficult times?

It’s a challenging time for everyone and recognizing the silver linings is important. This is the first time in most of our lives that the world has confronted a common threat, with no clear, long-term path forward. Such a challenge tends to bring out the best, and sometimes, unfortunately, the worst in people. I’ve got to believe this surreal and enormously challenging collective experience will bring us all closer together.

From a very different angle, we work primarily in the plastics packaging industry, which has been under attack, some of it justifiably. There’s too much plastic waste; actually, too much waste overall. No argument. And there is a lot of room for improvement. But at the same time, it has been almost impossible to show people that plastics have incredible benefits and that’s why we use them. Now with this humanitarian crisis upon us, it is abundantly clear that the packaging our customers provide will prove critical to food and medical supply-chain integrity.

3. How are you maintaining your company culture?

Our North American headquarters is the oldest and largest subsidiary in the Windmoeller & Hoelscher group. We employ 63 people. With a group this size, we are truly a family, with many employees having been with the company for over 20 years. I personally am in year 32 with the company. Needless to say, we care about one other. Now like any other day, we are in constant contact with one another for projects, meetings, to ask questions or check in. Mostly we do this through Microsoft Teams. We’ve even had a large evening happy hour with people tuning in from their homes. Our company culture is strong, and one can only suspect it will become even stronger from living and working through this crisis.

4. Did your business-continuity plan work or were there surprises?

So far, our business-continuity plan has worked. A surprise has definitely been how quickly we’d put one plan in place and need to change it just a day later. This is a very fluid situation and we need to be able to adjust in case of sickness, policy changes or state and regional restrictions. What we’ve done is to have as few people in the office as possible and social distancing and hand-washing is strictly enforced. Parts and technical support are an absolute must, so we have to do everything possible to keep that staff viable and effective. Scheduling and realizing technician visits will definitely keep us on our toes. I have no doubt there will be surprises in store.

5. Do you have advice for other local companies?

In very general terms, it’s imperative to keep employees healthy and safe and feeling comfortable, while being able to keep your company afloat. We believe, you get the most from employees who trust that you’re doing the right thing for them and their families, for their safety and both physical and financial health. In the end, if people maintain their health but have no job to come back to, then we haven’t done them any favors either. There is no way around it, it’s a time to think way out of the box, get creative, listen to employee input, find the courage to shape and implement strategies outside of your comfort zone and be ready to modify them on a dime.

Cassius Shuman is a PBN staff writer and researcher. He can be reached at shuman@pbn.com.