I spend a lot of time writing about small businesses, but I would be remiss if I didn’t also highlight larger manufacturing businesses from time to time.
While there are fewer factories than small businesses in Wellington County, they are a huge employer and important to our economy.
Last week I was invited to Nexans, an electric utility company in Fergus, for a unique celebration.
The plant has reached one million hours without a lost time injury. Calculated through looking at all employee time sheets, one million hours is roughly two and a half years in the Nexans world.
This is the first time the plant has reached this milestone since the 1980s.
The plant invited all employees working on Dec. 4 at 10:30am to a celebration with cake and draws draw for some pretty awesome prizes like large screen TVs, iPads, tools and more.
Looking around and seeing all the employees and the interest and excitement they had in reaching this milestone, I realized just how important it is and how much pride employees have in it. It is their health and safety, after all.
The plant manager made a comment in his speech about encouraging employees to take their workplace safety home and prevent injuries outside the plant as well.
Acknowledging and taking part in this celebration gives me the opportunity to remind the wider community in Wellington to keep safe and celebrate your victories, whatever they are.
Congratulations, Nexans. I hope you’re celebrating two million hours without a lost time injury in another two and a half years.
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This past weekend I attended three parades in Wellington County. That’s right, three parades. And at each one I was blown away by the local business participation.
Everywhere I looked there was either a business entering its own float or a local business sponsoring a float or a local business responsible for the vehicle pulling a float.
This year’s parades were exceptional; snowy and cold in some cases, but overall the parades and the community participation were incredible.
Way to celebrate the season, Wellington County!
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