Madison Burt, vice president of sales for Weima America, leads a seminar focused on wood and the company's various equipment installations and capabilities June 22, 2017, at its recently expanded U.S. headquarters in Fort Mill, South Carolina.
About 100 attendees, mostly dealers and some suppliers, participated in the three-day event that included a presentation from Weima CEO Martin Friz; educational and technical sessions on Weima equipment and installations; bus tours of three facilities where Weima equipment is running; and a golf tournament in addition to receptions.
Attendees traveled from Argentina, Canada, Chile, France, Germany, Mexico, Switzerland and Russia, as well as from many U.S. states. In addition, all U.S.-based Weima employees (about 35 people) were on-site as well as three representatives from Weima Germany: CEO Friz, Sales Manager Kay Schulte and Sales Engineer Stefan Reuss.
Weima last hosted a dealer event in 2013. Weima Marketing Manager Audrey Brewer says the 2013 event was about “half the size of this one” as it was not open to international dealers (only those from the U.S. and Canada were invited then). The company also recently completed an expansion to its headquarters, offering more space.
Including as many dealers as possible this year was key, Brewer says, as “it’s essential for them to know that there’s a team behind the machinery, and that with a Weima machine, a sale doesn’t end when the machine ships from our warehouse.
“[The 2013 event] was such a success that we wanted to wait a few years and do a much larger one with international representation,” Brewer says. “The world is becoming increasingly connected and we felt it was an exciting opportunity to showcase our international presence.”
Brewer adds that bringing many dealers together is a win-win situation. In addition to bouncing ideas off one another, attendees saw firsthand the various industries Weima serves and new applications to consider.
The event featured equipment demonstrations of 10 Weima machines with a variety of application types: wood, paper, film, purge, automotive components, plastic pallets, wooden pallets, wood chips/dust, wood ripping and metal turnings. Brewer says one of the most interesting demonstrations was of the two-stage shredder/granulator system. “The full system in operations is impressive,” she says.
“The benefit of an event like this … is that Weima manufactures machinery for a wide range of applications, and seeing these machines and operations in person has given so many of our dealers new ideas of ways to incorporate Weima into operations with whom they’re already working,” Brewer says. “They feel immensely prepared to go out and represent Weima because they’ve see what our machinery can do.”
Thursday, June 22, attendees were separated into four different groups, switching from one of four rooms every 45 minutes. The four session topics were wood, paper and plastic recycling, briquetting and waste-to-energy applications. In the briquetting seminar, Neil Poissant, who recently joined the company in the position of briquette sales coordinator, shared, “We feel the metals industry is going to be the largest segment of growth for Weima.”
Poissant pointed to a screen with images of aluminum briquettes made with Weima equipment. This equipment, he said, can reduce the volume of material by up to 90 percent.
In paper recycling facilities, Weima machines are used as a precautionary measure, Poissant said. “A $20,000 machine protects from $10 million in fines.”
Schulte, an export sales manager for Weima in South America, Japan and the U.K., shared several applications for Weima equipment in the paper and plastic recycling sector. He showed images of a Pratt Industries’ book recycling plant in Gary, Indiana, where a Weima machine preshreds books. He also showed Weima equipment processing agricultural film, intermediate bulk container (IBC) containers and film.
Later in the day Thursday, attendees toured a film recycling plant as part of the bus tour. New London, North Carolina-based Fiberon makes wood-alternative decking, railing and fencing products.
The bus tour also included stops at a Georgia-Pacific, Mount Holly, North Carolina, diapermaking plant where fiber dust is being briquetted as well as a secure document destruction facility where Weima equipment shreds documents.
Brewer says Weima plans to host its next dealer event in three years. While the event is beneficial to attendees to learn, it also helps Weima to better understand its employees, she says.
Brewer explains, “It’s also a great opportunity for us to hear from our dealers. They communicate to us during this event about things they encounter in the field, and it always gives us ideas of how we can better support our distributor network while they’re in the field. The more confident they feel with our machinery, the more likely they are to find good homes for it.”
