I can give you my first hand account of what i have dealt with when c.a.r. Was bought out by dubois. I like c.a.r., im happy with the chemicals, happy with the prices, i am super happy with the salesman we have. When the buyout first happened we were given the usual "nothig will change". Of course things change, thats why they buy each other out. First it was internal things with personel etc. departments were merged for cost savings, like payroll, employees were let go. Benefit plans changed, employees were angry. There was an influx of new money into c.a.r., that allowed them to buy new delivery trucks as there old ones sucked. Most things started to be consolidated out of massachusetts and into ohio where dubois is located. Billing for example became a nightmare. Any invoice discrepencies took/can take forever to deal with. some of this can be attributed to a companies growing pains but a lot is also due to dealing with a much larger company that reacts much slower then the old one.
Then the real consolidation started. They moved all production from massachusetts to ohio, then moved the mass facility to another smaller location that is used for just storage. Because the new location was smaller and because they werent producing chems anymore there, picking up of empty drums became an issue. They are limited to space for storage so when they run out they wont take the empties back. That was never a problem. They also had issues with supply, before, when they ran out of a chemical they just made more, now they have to order more from ohio, and the trucks only hold so much, so they sometimes ran out of certain chemicals, or certain sizes. Then to correct all that they wanted to streamline everything and reduce supply issues so they started to eliminate the amount of sku's they sold. So chemicals you could get in 5,15,30,55 gallon drums before may now only come in 5 and 30. They eliminate 2 "sku's" and have less of a chance of running out of the ones they still have. But if your used to buying 15 gallon drums of something and now you either buy 5 or 30 its annoying!
Old company was faster at responding to things, if they ran out of a 15 of low ph they poured it out of a 30. Problem solved. That cant be done under dubois because the 30 is a sku that needs to be accounted for. Now you wait for the truck from ohio. The old company provided a lot of free ****, foot valves, hose, metering tips, check valves, spray nozzles, etc..... the new company still does, but it has its limits. If you want 3 bixes of 3/8 hose, they will give you 1 or 2 and you pay for the others.
This is not a hit piece on dubois or c.a.r., i actually really like them. So far they have been a stand up company. Any problems have been fixed, albeit slower then before. Although the only thing that got quicker was billing, of course! They switched to invoicing by email the day before the delivery shipped as opposed to after delivery. It was helpfull in a way, it allowed you to verify the order was correct on paper before it was shipped instead of after. You can still see the resentment in delivery drivers who openly mock the new company, that can lead to an F' thjs job attitude.
I was worried that because i was a small account i would be cast to the wolves due to low profit for them, or they would switch delivery to drop ship by carrier instead of their own trucks. Yes there was a recent price increase but that seems to be industry wide. But at least my other fears havent come true yet. Things may still change in the future. Another plus is having access to a larger portfolio, i could order blendco stuff if i wanted, and now they are starting to market a chemical monitoring system developed with the same company that partnered with ZEP on theirs. But overall, if you asked me if i thought consolidation was good for the industry i would probably say no. I like knowing the owner of the company i deal with is in the upstairs office, not the high rise in ohio.
