This week, I was pleased when I received a purchase order from our newest retailer, Carl’s Store located in Tusket, Nova Scotia. Carl’s Store will be offering their customers, Trail Blazer’s Telescopic Ratchet Anvil & Bypass Loppers, Telescopic Geared Hedge Shears, Xtreme Ergo & Mini Hatchets plus our Telescopic Geared & 5-Pulley Tree Pruners.
I received a positive reply to one of my many e-mails I send to potential dealers & distributors. It came from Leigh Carter, the general manager with Q-Outdoor, a potential new distributor located in Bloomington, Minnesota, USA. Leigh said … she is certainly interested in working with us but they are a little swamped from their post-OR Summer market follow-ups and getting ready to launch their model year programs. After their bike industry trade show next week, their team will sit down to review potential new brands and vendors, and they will be able to follow up more concretely then. I’m hoping Leigh’s team chooses Trail Blazer Products to be included in their model year programs.
Rob with Canteen Shop, started field testing Trail Blazer Products and built a work bench using our Xtreme folding saw and said it worked pretty well. He felt the coating created friction and slowed down the stroke a bit. He will test other Trail Blazer Products soon. I would recommend using Trail Blazer’s 10″ Folding Xtend-A-Saw for this job in the future.
Ron Isaacs, our sales rep located in Chicago, Illinois USA heard from the Craftsman brand product manager for pruning tools. She will be his primary contact person to work with going forward for all new products that could potentially be branded as Craftsman. She said … the bow saw that is currently supplied to them under the Craftsman brand through Trail Blazer Products Limited, is well constructed and stands apart from other bow saws in the market place in design and quality. She is interested in products that are innovative, differentiated with purpose for the target customer as potential branding under the Craftsman label.
Back at the office, during our weekly staff meeting, we started focusing on daily shipping goals. This is to help improve delivery performance as a team, where all departments ask what they can do to help. Justin from administration and Monica from customer service volunteered some time to get all the 18” Take-Down Buck Saws packaged for shipping.
The Levangie Family jumped in and volunteered some time as well, as we set up at home in the evenings to get some 15” Sawvivor Saws and Green Thumb Xtend-A-Saws, branded for True Value Hardware in the United States, assembled & packaged for shipping. It started off with myself sitting in my favorite chair (My Happy Place), assembling Sawvivor parts and watching Canada fight to make the 2014 World Cup (Go Canada Go). I was soon joined by my wife, Dawna and my daughter, Natalie. Before I knew it we had an assembling line and my jeep was full of completed products for shipping. It was fun and reminded me of when Trail Blazer first started with Dawna & I in my apartment … Natalie was a great addition to our team.
The production team continued building Mark’s Choice Xtend-A-Saws, Telescopic Loppers, Shears & Tree Pruners, the Premier Professional Paint Poles and Craftsman’s 24” Bow Saws while Take-Down wood blades are made to begin production of our 24” Take-Down Buck Saw … shipping across Canada, France, Germany & the United States.
All the Best, Shawn Levangie