What the Chart and Ratermann Partnership Means for Gas Distributors

Jill Avono: Foreign

George Raderman: welcome to the High Pressure Podcast with me, George Raderman and me, Marie

Marie: Williams, brought to you by reliably Routerman,

George Raderman: bringing you industry news and trends, plus

Marie: insightful conversations with industry leaders.

George Raderman: Let's get to today's show. Well, we'd like to welcome everybody to another episode of the High Pressure podcast here at Rodman Factoring. And today I've got our host, co host Marie Rotterman next to me. And then we also have Mary Carter, uh, Rodderman. So today though is a super duper special day. This is a broadcaster's moment that today we're going to be able to say that we are now officially the Chart Distribution for North America for micro bulk tanks and cryogenic cylinders. And joining us here today is Gary Dagenhart from Chart and Jill Avono, CEO of Chart. Jill, welcome and love to hear your first thoughts here of what this means to you think to Chart and Rotterman.

Jill Avono: Thanks George and great to be here with you, Marie and Mary. Um, I'm just so thrilled today. This has been a, uh, really long time coming from our perspective at Chart. To be able to partner with Rotterman is uh, one of the greatest, uh, I think accomplishments that we have had in the Chart history. Uh, and we're so excited for having uh, the ability to continue to build our distribution network with uh, folks that are tried and true in the industrial gas industry. Multiple different end markets. Um, the Routerman team is, I would say, experts in being able to get to the right end customers and, and this gives us another avenue to deliver a high quality, uh, product and have a great expanded team through our partnership.

George Raderman: That's great. Well, I got to tell you, I really want to ask Marie because I know Maria was really a large part of the negotiations with all the folks at Chart and all of your thoughts?

Marie: Um, yeah, I mean, first of all, it's just like the pinch me moment. I keep. I wake up and I'm like, wait, is this real? This is happening? Um, growing up in the industry, I just. And you know, getting to see you work at a gas distributor and now having Ratterman, all I hear is the reliability that Chart has been and is from their product line. And I know that Radterman through and through, through the details is all about reliability when it comes to service. So it's kind of this perfect match of a partnership is how I think of it. And being able to provide, um, that service with that type of product to the independent market so that they can be as competitive as possible and get out There and grow into new market shares is, is just a dream. I'm excited.

George Raderman: Fantastic. Hey, I would like to ask you, uh, Gary, from your view, what does this mean to a gas distributorship? What does this mean to the independent gas distributor?

Gary Dagenhart: Well, you know, this is actually the joining of really the two leading distributors for liquid products, uh, here in the U.S. our quality and capabilities to produce a high level product and your capabilities of marketing, managing and customer support,

Jill Avono: um,

Gary Dagenhart: really have been a key feature and the key reason for making this happen in the first place. For the last few years I've been trying to come up with uh, a solution for how do we match your ability to provide, uh, equipment to customers. And I haven't been able to do that within a budget that Joe would ever approve. So. And that's for donor to reach that goal. So I think distributors will quickly see advantages of these, of this great relationship.

George Raderman: That's great. You know, I think a lot of distributors listening to this announcement, you know, there's been a lot that's gone on, uh, with Chart in the last, you know, period of time with Baker Hughes and purchase and things like that. I just want to get your feedback, if I could, Jill, on from a distributor's perspective of how you see this now and the position, the charts in the position we're at together, uh, doing the distribution for micro bulks and liquid cylinders.

Jill Avono: I see this as a great position for our industry, for ourselves, both Radderman and Chart together, and for all independent distributors in the market. Uh, the combination of Baker Hughes and Chart brings us access to even more, um, opportunities with new customers, a variety of existing customers. But I think right now the distribution channel is uh, stronger than ever and is really needed by the market, uh, for the demand that we're seeing in a variety of different end markets.

George Raderman: So agree with you. Um, you know, one of the comments that we've heard in the marketplace is that people are saying, well, where. What will be the excitement level of Chart with Baker Hughes? Will that be such a small part of their company that maybe they won't get the full attention? I'd like to just straight out address that to you.

Jill Avono: Yeah, I think it's the exact opposite of that. You know, this has been a partnership with Baker Hughes in CHART that we've developed, um, primarily on the energy side of the business over many working together, um, primarily with charts, applying key equipment into, uh, applications that Baker Hughes provides. Baker Hughes has a strategy to continue to diversify their portfolio, um, not to stay so close to the oil field. Services side, but to further penetrate the industrial element of the business. And uh, we are a key catalyst, Chart Industries is a key catalyst to be able to help them accomplish that goal. And, and therefore they have, uh, an immense amount of attention not only on Chart, but also on our channels on our customer. Uh, our distribution channels are ways to market because for them this is a slightly different way of hitting different markets than what they're used to in oil field services. So we become a critical factor and a catalyst to help them achieve their goals. Of the industrial diversification side, um, I've spoken directly to, uh, their CEO and chairman of the board who is extremely keen to grow the industrial gas segment of the business. Um, he has a hyper focus on that. And as a matter of fact, um, one of the connections that we will be making with not only Ratterman, but many of our key industrial gas, uh, partners that we're going to, um, have touch points with them on an ongoing basis for the next, uh, years ahead. And that's going to get set up here in the coming week or two.

George Raderman: Yeah. And that was one of the things. I'm really glad to hear it from you and I think all the distributors are gonna be thrilled to hear this from you because it's one of the things that we were very excited about too. Right. Sometimes things can kind of like get in a holding pattern and kind of get slowly sunsetted where this is really quite the opposite. It's really the investment and really make the next future what can be. And that's what we're excited to be part of as well with Chart.

Jill Avono: I think it's also worth noting that, um, this was an early conversation before we ever announced that Baker Hughes was acquiring Chart Industries. Uh, the dialogue that I had directly with their CEO and chairman was we were talking with you guys about this partnership and we went through the articulation as to why it makes a heck of a lot of sense to do. And from day one, he and they and their entire board and executive team were aware that we were working on getting to this answer and extremely supportive. Um, I'd love to send the email when I said we got it done, um, that he sent back and it had, uh, a bunch of smiley emojis and a fantastic. We're really excited about it. So, um, this is true stories here. And uh, that's, I think, probably the best way to articulate where, um, where the sentiment is toward this relationship.

George Raderman: Oh man, when you get smiling emojis, that. That's about as good as it gets. Right.

Jill Avono: Smiling emojis pretty much covers it, right?

George Raderman: It does, it does.

Marie: I think George is more a woo woo.

George Raderman: Yeah, I am more of a woo woo.

Gary Dagenhart: Yeah.

Marie: I don't know if he knows how to get to the emoji.

George Raderman: Well that's, that's what I said after our folks. I had a big long woo woo. Yeah, yeah, that's great. And Gary, what are your thoughts when you think of it from the mindset of a distributor?

Gary Dagenhart: Yeah, I think distributors have always been uh, in need of a supplier who can provide just in time servicing and product capabilities. And they have done a good job of allowing Chart to have uh, additional time to get things done mainly because of the quality provide. But now they're going to have the opportunity to have both that quality and they're going to get the just in time service plus the communication that look, even this podcast offers. So that, so hearing what CHART is doing, what we're building, what we're accomplishing through your network and your communication, that is going to improve for both of us and I'm excited to have that uh, ah, for us in the future.

George Raderman: Marie, what would be your number one thought when you're looking at ah, it from the distributors and what you've been hearing distributors are looking for when they're talking about service?

Marie: Yeah, I mean I'm on the road going across the country visiting customers all the time and when I'm seeing customers I am wanting to ask the difficult questions. So some of those questions are what do you like about your current supplier? What could we be doing better, you know, those type of things. And Chart comes up. Absolutely. And I have always, always, always heard that Chart is the best product that they can buy because they know that they're going to put it into the field and it's set it and forget it, they don't have to worry about anything. I think where Radarman shines is, and Jill touched on it as well, is the service side of it. So I think immediate impact um, from the distributor side is potential enhancement on the service of having that touch point that's going to be getting back to you within the first hour or two that you're getting. If you don't get us live, which is rare, um, we're going to be getting back to you right away and then um, with the strong partnership that we have with Chart and that communication channel that we have going, we'll be able to get answers out right away along with shipments out, potentially same day for next day delivery, which would be great.

George Raderman: Yeah, Mary, I Want to ask you a question, ma'.

Gary Dagenhart: Am.

George Raderman: Mary, you're handling the VP of operations and processes. So really all the distribution of product, our facilities. Could you touch on that and what we're doing for the different products coming from chart?

Mary Carter: Yeah, it's really exciting because we're going to be um, distributing products from all three of our warehouses. So that's Nashville, Tennessee, Houston, Texas and then um, Livermore, California. So we're really going to be, you know, strengthen this partnership even further. Being able to kind of supply anybody within honestly days time.

George Raderman: And what will that mean to a customer? Let's say you're in Nashville or near Nashville. They could, will call.

Mary Carter: Yeah, they could absolutely will call. You can will call at all three of our locations.

George Raderman: Yeah, so we got will call and shipping and uh, and then also the freight costs. I think that brings some freight costs down.

Mary Carter: Yeah. Oh absolutely. So not only will it impact um, or rather positively impact, um, a decrease in freight times, but also.

George Raderman: Yep. So you get it quicker and cost less per freight. That's a pretty good thing. That's great. Gary, um, would you touch a little bit on the distribution and what you're seeing there with uh, the relationship with Rotterman?

Gary Dagenhart: Yeah, I think one of the key points is that having multiple locations,

Jill Avono: uh,

Gary Dagenhart: you have the ability to provide, like you said, to all of the regions company in a much more efficient and cost effective way. Charts have been kind of limited in the fact that we've only got our facility in Canton, Georgia that is stocking any, any tanks and we don't have the capability to put a lot of inventory on the ground. We've tried for years to, to build a stock but it gets um, purchased rather rapidly and we're back to uh, supplying after production. What we're going to be able to do now is build and start filling trailers that will be ready to go to any of the Radarman facilities at a moment's notice. So um, we should be able to maintain uh, inventory levels at Radiman's facilities that will allow them to provide just in time out of their inventory.

Marie: That's awesome.

George Raderman: That's great. And you know Jill, you talked earlier about alignment and I have to so agree with you. You know, when we look at our three claims, our three claims are reliable people. We have phenomenal people organization. We have people people. We have a long period of time people will work at Broderman and uh, each year we have our awards and we have our awards for 10 or 15, 20 years. And uh, we're so excited about the quality of the folks we have and they're excited about wanting to take care of customers. Genuinely, genuinely. You know the fruition of actually making things rivals reliable solutions together, which is our other claim, having reliable solutions put that together and really help customers with what we do. And then also reliable delivery and what we can do to lean in reliable delivery to make sure that that happens. So I look at those things, I tie that into you know, Marie and Jill and Gary, what, what chart has and the quality of the product and our on time delivery of product coming into our facilities for manufacturing. And man I just get super duper excited about that. I mean this is going to be not only fun, it's going to be you know, what we do, you know, give service to customers that they're looking for. You know, our hours are you know from up ship up to 8 o' clock at night, east coast time. So we get products out the same day. You know, it's just going to be a really, I think for all of us a fun lot of work, but a lot of fun. And uh, have a lot of fun with our distributors in the meantime as we do this.

Marie: Jill, I have a few questions for you. What has been your experience with Radterman prior to this distributor um, partnership? What has that experience looked like and what are your hopes of what this will bring to distributors or where you see this in a year, two years, three years.

Jill Avono: Yeah. So I would say to date my, that's cool, I'm good with it. To date my experience has been exceptional. Um, and I think Gary would uh, actually echo that for years. M. Before my experience started with you as well. Um, and all the reasons that George just touched on, on the people number one and the reliability and uh, as you said the service side. And that's something that I think uh, by staying focused on what you have established as the foundation and done really well at that's uh, served the business extraordinarily well. So that's the starting point for what I'm really excited about is that the focus and the connection points and the position uh, and perspective that I have, I believe many, many others in the market have that same view of Radarman. And I want that I. What I see here is a win win situation which if we can prove that this is what we expect it to be and how we've worked together over the years and even more so over the last six months, I think that um, we can show this industry that we working together is better than trying to fight each other and There's a way to have the partnership be a win win and a way to really drive um, success and further um, further industrial gas as a whole.

Marie: Fantastic. Yeah, it's like the, it's two strengths coming together which is a win for everyone. And also I just wanted to tell you from a personal note, I remember when you became CEO of Chart and I had to like double take. I was like there is a female CEO in this industry. And it's. You've totally inspired me in a lot of different directions. So thank you. And um, yeah, it's been awesome getting to know you and get to work with you.

Jill Avono: Yeah, it's been great to get to know you too. And it's an inspiration to be in uh, an industry where uh, regardless of gender, everybody's been amazing and that I think is pretty rare these days. So um, I look forward to many, many more conversations and certainly a lot more fun together.

Marie: Absolutely.

George Raderman: Well, well Jill, I gotta tell you, so glad you could make it today. And Gary, uh, you know, appreciate the uh, the time you took. Uh, I think that the industry is excited about where we're going and I think as they hear the words of the investment and what's going to be going on in Chart, uh, as far the future and then this distributor relationship that we have uh, in selling the microbulk tanks and your liquid cylinders in North America, uh, through our different distribution locations, I I am m telling you we're going to have a lot of, a lot of excitement out there and we're. Our folks are out there to take care of customers and uh, we are so excited about the future and what we're going to be doing together. So thank you for both making the time today.

Jill Avono: All right, let's rock and roll.

Gary Dagenhart: Thank you George, Marie, Mary, appreciate it and I'm looking forward to all the work we're going to be putting in together.

Jill Avono: Thank you.

George Raderman: Bye Bye.

Marie: Bye.

George Raderman: Thanks for watching. Stay up to date with the latest news in the gas and welding industry by clicking on the subscribe button and

Marie: check out one of our other videos to learn more. Find out more about reliably radterman@rmiorder.com.