New at Creative Safety Supply – Collision Sentry Warning System
In workplaces where both pedestrians and indoor vehicles such as forklifts need to share the same space, accidents are a real possibility. Unfortunately, when accidents occur between people and vehicles, the results can be very serious. Most facilities try to put up safety signs to remind everyone to be careful, but that is not always…
Tony Ferraro | January 23, 2017 | Product Spotlight | Warning System | 3 min read
Are Safety Professionals Often Snake Oil Salesmen?
When working in the safety industry your performance can (and all too often does) mean the difference between life and death. The difference between having someone go home after a long day at work, and having someone go to the hospital after an accident. We would all like to think that every safety professional in…
Tony Ferraro | January 19, 2017 | Safety Solutions | OSHA, Safety, Workplace Safety | 3 min read
A Conversation on How to be an Effective Safety Professional
An interesting post was recently made by Doug Thompson in the EHSQ Elite Safety Group on LinkedIn, which prompted quite a thought provoking discussion. Mr. Thompson is a student at Columbia Southern University, and he titled his post, “Advice on how to be an effective safety professional.” He then wrote just one simple sentence, which…
Tony Ferraro | January 18, 2017 | Safety Solutions | 5S, Safety, Six Sigma | 3 min read
The 5th S | Sustaining Your Improvements
When learning the 5S methodology, the vast majority of the time spent will be on the first four S’s. The last S, which stands for Shitsuke, or Sustain, however, is almost certainly going to be the most important one. Without this S, all the others would quickly fall out of use and the progress that…
Tony Ferraro | January 16, 2017 | 5S | 5S, Sustain | 3 min read
Make Warehouse Labels with Your LabelTac Printer
When operating a warehouse, nothing is more important than organization. Warehouses often have thousands of shelves, and it is essential to be able to pinpoint where each piece of inventory is located at a given time. For many companies, this is where a LabelTac label printer can really help to get the job done. LabelTac…
Tony Ferraro | January 10, 2017 | Product Spotlight | Barcoding, Industrial Label Printers, Label Makers, Labeling, Rack Labeling, Safety, Warehouse Labels | 3 min read
How to Clean Floor Tape
Using floor tape is a great way to keep a facility safe, organized, and efficient. Just like any type of flooring, floor tape can get quite dirty over time. When floor tape gets dirty, it can become harder to see, which defeats the purpose of using it at all. This is why so many people…
Tony Ferraro | January 5, 2017 | Product Spotlight | Facility Marking, Floor Marking, Floor Tape, Safety | 2 min read
March 2017 is the First Annual #LadderSafetyMonth
Millions of people each year climb up on ladders to complete a wide range of different tasks. Whether it is a homeowner trying to fix the siding, or a construction company working on a job, ladders are an essential tool that most people will need to use at one time or another. Unfortunately, ladders also…
Tony Ferraro | January 4, 2017 | Industry News | Ladder Safety, OSHA, Safety, Workplace Safety | 2 min read
SafetyTac Floor Marking Tape in Real 5S Projects
We often read about how 5S strategies and projects can help improve the safety and efficiency of the workplace. For those who are just starting to consider using them in the work place, all of this can seem like a lot of theory without any concrete examples of what things like lean tape, hazard tape,…
Tony Ferraro | December 30, 2016 | Product Spotlight | Facility Marking, Floor Marking, Organized Workplace, Safety, Workplace Safety | 3 min read
What is Yokoten & Why Don’t Most Companies Use it?
When it comes to safe and efficient operation of a workplace, most people are used to reading Japanese terms like Kaizen, Gemba, Gembutsu, Kanban, and more. Many companies, however, overlook the term Yokoten, and the many benefits it can bring. Barry Jeffrey posted an interesting article to the LinkedIn Group, “Gemba Academy,” where it generated…
Tony Ferraro | December 22, 2016 | Lean | 5S, Gemba, Kaizen, Kanban, Yokoten | 3 min read
Improving Safety Through Broad Knowledge
Conventional wisdom suggests that the safety manager at a facility needs to be an expert on things like applicable OSHA regulations, incident rates, and safety patterns at the facility itself. While all of this may be true, Dr. Judith A. Erickson argues that their knowledge must be much broader than that in order to truly…
Tony Ferraro | December 19, 2016 | Safety Solutions | 5S, OSHA, Safety, Workplace Safety | 3 min read
Can Your Office Benefit from Lean Strategies?
When most people think of LEAN, they think of manufacturing, and it is no surprise why. A recent post by Mark Bridges in the “Lean Six Sigma and Continuous Improvement Group” on LinkedIn, brings up the idea of using Lean strategies in an office environment. His post looked specifically at how the office side of a…
Tony Ferraro | December 14, 2016 | Lean | Lean Strategies | 3 min read
Classic Vs. Modern Definition of Root Cause | Which is Better?
A post on LinkedIn by Mark Paradies of TapRoot recently discussed the difference between the ‘old fashioned’ definition of root cause, and the more modern version. Mark’s post, and the discussion it generated, were quite interesting and offer a lot of important insights that managers, business owners, and others can benefit from. Root cause is a key concept…
Tony Ferraro | December 13, 2016 | Safety Solutions | Root Cause | 3 min read
Hand Safety
When thinking about safety in the work place, it is absolutely critical to start with the hands. Over a million hand injuries occur in the workplace each year, with many of them causing a serious disability or even amputation. The most common type of injury is a laceration, which causes 63% of all disabling workplace…
Tony Ferraro | October 18, 2016 | Safety Solutions | Hand Safety | 3 min read
5S Program – Sort
When learning about the 5S program most people can quickly see how it can be helpful and improve efficiency in the facility. The whole strategy is quite easy when looking at it at a high level. If you’re not careful, however, it can get confusing with the actual implementation. This is because some of the…
Tony Ferraro | August 10, 2016 | 5S | 5S | 4 min read
TPM Lean Production
Total productive maintenance, or TPM is a program that can help a facility to keep their machines in operation as much as possible. It is generally considered a part of the LEAN methodologies as it greatly reduces downtime, which is a form of waste. While the goal is simple (improved machine production) it is actually…
Tony Ferraro | August 1, 2016 | Lean | Lean Production, TPM | 4 min read
