Global Fastener News

PERSPECTIVE: Quips of 2000

John Wolz

Southwestern Fastener Association president Mary Chambers was introducing each new member company when she came to e-fastener.com/a partini company and found there was no hometown on the membership certificate. �When you are a dot.com you don�t have to be from anywhere,� Chambers ad-libbed.

Just jumping on the Internet doesn�t guarantee success, Ross Barnhill observed at the Western Association of Fastener Distributors fall meeting. In the past couple years there has been �a gold rush mentality, with real sensible people quitting their day jobs anticipating becoming dot.com millionaires. This year the Internet is delivering a big dose of reality, with bankruptcy lawyers becoming the new dot.com millionaires,� he remarked.

�Make me neutral on this one,� one fastener organization executive requested after explaining the background on a potentially explosive issue.

FIN Survey question: What is a fastener? Check which of the following should be considered a �fastener industry product.� Among products written in on the �other� blank were screw machine parts, specials, studs and threaded rod. One quipster added: �wedding ring, dog collar, shoelace, credit card and mortgage.�

The National Fastener Distributors Association honored two industry veterans � Gary Edick and Jim Zehnder � with lifetime memberships at its annual meeting. Edick responded by stepping to the microphone, thanking members and stressing that he wanted to �put to rest rumors that I am retiring.�
Seconds later Zehnder in turn told the members, �I want to put to rest rumors that I would not retire.�

As the U.S. presidential election results remained uncertain for weeks, one fastener supplier suggested Al Gore and George W. Bush follow Jim and John Zehnder�s method of annually alternating the Earnest Machine presidency.

The Fastener Quality Act dominated the Quips of the Year until it was gutted in 1999. At the 2000 spring meeting NFDA president Joe McIlhon pointed out that �there is not one reference to the FQA� in the program agenda and that the PLTF now stands for �Permanently, Legally, Thoroughly Finished� instead of Public Law Task Force.

Was it worth it to Jim Snider to sell his distributorship to W�rth Group, delay an early retirement to direct a turnaround of W�rth Service Supply and bring the W�rth companies together as the first North American general manager? The answer is on the backside of his retirement business card: A picture of his yacht named �W�rth It.�

�If dead fastener stock began to stink once it got close to being really dead � like fruit or veggies � we would act more quickly to eliminate it from our warehouse (vault).� Scott Stratman of The Distribution Team observed.

Some Quips of the Year aren�t attributed for diplomatic reasons. One 1999 unidentified quip led to three people thanking FIN for not naming them as the source.

An issue of FIN mailed to subscriber Ted Robinson at Fastener & Fittings Inc. in Mississauga, Ontario, was marked �deceased� by the Canadian postal service and returned. When FIN contacted his office, Robinson responded, �I may look like hell, but I am alive. Please keep sending your newsletter to me. Thanks, Ted Robinson, VP (Not R.I.P.)�

And the Flip-Flop of the Year Award goes not to a politician but to the management of the National Industrial Fastener Show in Columbus, OH. In the summer of 1999 show management announced they were cutting the 2000 show to one day: �This is something we have considered for the past several years. It no longer makes good business sense to have the expo open for a half day on Wednesday. We are still getting a good crowd on Tuesday, but the Wednesday morning attendance has waned significantly in recent years, and we don�t feel right about asking our exhibitors to incur the expense of an additional night�s stay for the relatively small number of new people they see. This is the new trend in conventions and trade shows for busy people: in, bang, out.�
By spring 2000 even before trying the one-day format, show management announced the 2001 show would return to 1 1/2 days.
One exhibitor suggested that �maybe picking up Tuesday night hotel bills will help them �feel right.�� \