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By MATTHEW BRODSKY, senior editor/Web editor of Risk & Insurance®

The Rawlings wooden baseball bat factory in Dolgeville, N.Y., is but one facility owned and operated by parent company Jarden Corp. Jarden is a niche consumer products manufacturer based in Rye, N.Y., but with 20,000 employees the world over. Some of its more familiar brands now include Mr. Coffee, Sunbeam, Coleman, and Bicycle and Bee playing cards and chips, to name a few.

Well, as we saw in our article in the November issue about that loss-prevention survey, "Hitting Loss Prevention out Of the Park," sometimes loss prevention at these smaller-value facilities can be nearly as important as the attention paid to multimillion-dollar properties.

Don't think Karl Miller, director of corporate risk at Jarden, doesn't know it.

In fact, he told Risk & Insurance® that all of the loss-prevention surveys done for Jarden by its principal property insurer, Allianz, are "very important" because of their expert assessments and concrete recommendations.

When the report comes in from the Allianz engineers, Miller explained, his internal team looks at it and also solicits commentary from Jarden's broker at Marsh. Then they forward the report to the individual facility, as well as a form for the facility managers to use to provide feedback and progress reports.

The facility has 30 to 60 days to fix any problem determined to have a human element. Minor mechanical repairs are allotted 90 days to get corrected, unless there are extenuating circumstances, said Miller. The more expensive fixes--say, a wholesale sprinkler system installation--get considered at the enterprise level. According to Miller, Jarden has completed some of these very large projects within the last few years around the world. Most have been sprinkler installations, he said, and infrequently they've seen recommendations for earthquake retrofitting.

Whatever the suggested fix, Miller's office monitors the progress, and every month sends out a report to senior corporate management, the broker and the insurers. The report updates the status of the recommendations from the loss-prevention survey. In particular, the process has buy-in and support from the corporate leadership.

"It gets substantial visibility throughout the organization," Miller said.

As for how the Rawlings plant and other facilities get the nod to have the loss-prevention survey in the first place, Miller said that it's a collaborative effort between Jarden, its broker and Allianz, which occurs at the start of the policy year. Allianz comes up with the initial list of facilities to send engineers to, and Jarden ultimately agrees or suggests others.

"We do arrange to have the facilities given heads-up," Miller said. That way, the folks on the ground know that it's an important process and that they ought to be prepared for it.

November 1, 2010

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