Looking Back and Being Thankful
Looking back on 2017 I have quite a lot to be thankful for, both personally and professionally.
It has been a great year for myself and my family. My children are growing, physically, mentally and spiritually. My family has been blessed with good health and prosperity. I myself have been able to accomplish most of my goals for the year, except maybe that 10 pounds I was planning on losing, but we do not have to talk about that….
Holmatro family
Professionally, I celebrated my 12 ½ year anniversary with Holmatro (13 as of December 1st). This is a milestone with the company celebrated by dinner and well wishes from colleagues worldwide. In the big picture, it is not a long tenure. In some ways I am still the new kid here. With so many coworkers having 20, 25 and even 30 years with the company, I have a long ways to go. It seems once someone becomes a member of the family, few ever leave. We have celebrated a few retirements this year, bittersweet, but joyous. Yes, I call it a family. During a recent visit by a customer to our production facility and American corporate headquarters ,one the firefighters described us as just that, a family. He said that he was shocked that a global business, one of largest in the rescue industry, would have such a laid back, family atmosphere. For that I am thankful.
Phenomenal year
What kind of year did Holmatro have; nothing short of phenomenal. We celebrated our 50thanniversary, a milestone few privately owned companies can say today. Our innovations have continued to set the bar for others in the market to attempt to achieve. Our Greenline battery powered rescue tools continue to EVOlve, now utilizing state of the art brushless motors and electronic speed control. They are now unequaled in the market when it comes to power, speed and weight. All this while still maintaining partnerships with our legacy customers, by making this innovation easily retrofitted to most existing Holmatro tools. New technology has led us to unprecedented success this year in both small and large fire departments globally, adding to our market dominance. The continued building of our 5000 series rescue tools has led to new telescopic rams with integrated laser pointer and a heavy-duty combi tool. All of these, again, unequaled, the most powerful, highest performing tools of their class. And let us not forget the continued success this year with two other game changing advances. Inclined Cutting, another unequaled concept improving safety and efficiency, but overall, just making the job of rescuers, our customers, easier. Last but not least, CORE Technology. Now over a decade in the market, it is still unmatched in simplicity, efficiency and safety.
Thanks to people
Through all of this we are still a humble group. We realize we owe our success to people. This was one of the core principles set by our founder; people are the key. The people that work quietly behind the scenes bringing these concepts to reality. The back office workers, production personnel and assembly folks that keep our machine functioning and the people on the street that are the face of Holmatro. All of us that work as a team to serve the most important people, our customers, our partners. We owe our success to all of you that put your trust in us each and every day. For that we are thankful and our pledge for 2018 is to continue to strive every day to deserve that trust.
We wish everyone worldwide good health, happiness and prosperity in the coming year.
Jason Bell
Southern Regional Manager
Holmatro USA