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Blackstone Valley
Tourism Council Northern Rhode Island Chamber of Commerce The Blackstone River Valley National Heritage Corridor
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Disaster Planning Businesses say plans for coping with a natural calamity include getting more supplies, communicating with workers and trying to stay open. 01:00 AM EDT on Sunday, July 16, 2006 *BY PAUL GRIMALDI Natural disasters can turn a business inside out. Managers used to running a company on a "last-in, first-out" basis have to work in reverse when a hurricane, blizzard or other calamity befalls a region. "You literally have to be the last one to leave town and the first one to come back or [people] freak out," said Jeff Lenard, director of public affairs for the National Association of Convenience Stores. How well businesses -- from convenience stores and mass marketers to banks and building-supply stores -- handle disasters helps determine how fast a city, state or region recovers from a disaster. "Everybody is very dependent on you and you're very dependent on your suppliers," Lenard said. Last year, the devastation during the worst hurricane season on record strained businesses in the Gulf of Mexico region and beyond. The storms killed hundreds of people and cost businesses billions of dollars. Hard experience has taught them that the time to plan for such disasters is before they happen, said business representatives. Some organizations take things with a "been-there, done-that" sense of corporate history. "We've done it a long time, so we have a good handle on what people need up here," said Arnold Bromberg, vice president at the Benny's chain, which predates the 1938 hurricane in New England. "We've come to know at certain times of the year . . . we make sure we have abundant supplies in the stores." Bromberg has helped his family-owned business manage through storms for decades having started working there, part-time, nearly 40 years ago. Other companies approach the topic with a regimental eye -- setting out policies and procedures that take effect as storms approach. "We almost take a military-like approach to preparing our stores," said Yancey Casey, a spokesman for The Home Depot Inc., of Atlanta. Corporate plans encompass: Storing emergency supplies; Contracting for emergency maintenance, fuel, power supplies and electronic-data backup; Tracking storms; Creating reserve-worker teams; Designating secondary headquarters; Securing housing and office trailers; Handling cash and payments; Stocking stores; Communicating with workers. Whether following formalized systems or gut feelings, business managers rarely hesitated when asked what takes priority. "The employees come first," said Ken Spader, vice president of construction and store planning for Brooks-Eckerd drugstores. Spader and others interviewed said they recognize that employees worry first about their families and homes in a storm or disaster before they concern themselves with work. Companies use toll-free hot lines, cell phones, phone trees, e-mail and simple word of mouth to ensure that workers are all right and to let them know when and where they should report to work. Some companies fly in managers and experienced workers from outside an affected region to relieve store staff. Lowe's Cos. Inc., for instance, sent 500 workers to the Gulf Coast after hurricanes Katrina and Rita slammed communities there. "We know our own employees have needs," said Karen Cobb, a Lowe's spokeswoman. Lowe's, Home Depot, Shaw's Supermarkets and others maintain employee-relief funds that funnel payments to workers who may have to rebuild homes, replace clothing or face medical bills in the aftermath of a disaster. Companies mobilize long before such charity work begins. Lowe's maintains a disaster command center at its Mooresville, N.C., headquarters where workers monitor weather and news reports, talk to distribution-center managers and interact with vendors, all to make sure the supplies and people get to stores where they are needed. Employee training sessions, dubbed "Hurricane 101" at one company, are mirrored by clinics for customers. Corporate Web sites and brochures offer planning tips for both groups. Supplies are positioned before those swirling white masses appear on Weather Channel broadcasts. At Westerly-based Washington Trust Bancorp, the key is cash. "If you've got a hurricane coming, the first thing you need is cash," said Beth Eckel, senior vice president of marketing for the bank. The lesson was reinforced during a recent conference call with a Gulf Coast counterpart, bank executives noted. The demand for cash rises as a storm approaches and peaks again after the weather clears. "People will want to come into the branch to get cash for food and whatever they need," said Bill Gibson, a senior vice president at the bank. The bank started stockpiling cash as summer began and will keep levels high through the hurricane season. In a power outage that knocks out ATMs, customers could get money the old-fashioned way -- by going to a teller. Banks, unlike coffee shops, trade in something of equal importance to cash -- financial information. With a headquarters near the mouth of the Pawcatuck River, Washington Trust executives know the building could get wiped out in a hurricane, they said. No sensitive records are kept in its basement and the bank relies on a data-storage company in Glastonbury, Conn., about 60 miles northeast, to keep duplicate files. Many companies, including Washington Trust, have backup headquarters. Bank executives would move to Cranston. Shaw's managers would relocate from West Bridgewater to East Bridgewater, both in Massachusetts. The Providence Journal Co.'s Fountain Street headquarters in downtown Providence flooded during hurricanes in 1938 and 1954. Today, if disaster struck, some newspaper employees would move elsewhere in the city, to one of its six distribution centers around the state or offices outside the state, the paper's executives said. Printing would shift to Manchester, N.H., where it has a reciprocal agreement with the Manchester Union-Leader. "For 177 years we have not missed a day of publication and we endeavor to keep that tradition alive," said Howard G. Sutton, the Journal Company's chairman, publisher, president and chief financial officer. "We will distribute our newspapers to as large a geographic area as we can safely serve." The company would post news on its Web site, projo.com , throughout a storm, officials said. "It increases our reach, it's faster," said Joel P. Rawson, senior vice president and executive editor. News gathering would focus on the storm. "We go into one-story mode," Rawson said. "All of our reporters and editors can be aimed at that story." Building closures are dictated by events on the ground, with companies following the lead of local emergency officials who may order travel bans or evacuations. "We stay open as long as the local governments allow," said Spader, of Brooks. Those decisions are fluid for franchise operations such as coffee chains Honey Dew Donuts and Dunkin' Donuts. Franchisees are responsible for their workers and buildings, putting them on the hook if something goes wrong, officials said. "We leave it up to the discretion of the franchisees themselves whether to open or close," said Richard J. Bowen, Honey Dew's president. A storm's aftermath poses differing problems. "There's no sort of cookie-cutter approach," said Steven Restivo, a media relations director for Wal-Mart Stores Inc. "You have to deal with each situation as it comes. One store may be sandbagged, with water lapping at its doors, while a nearby one may be on dry land and inundated with customers. With flooding, water vacuums and mops are in demand; with blizzards, snow shovels and road salt. Power might be out at some stores, with fuel in short supply and phones knocked out. Brooks-Eckerd would cut staffing to pharmacists and store managers, escorting customers inside if necessary. "If someone needs their heart medication, they need their heart medication," Spader said. CVS Corp., the nation's largest drugstore chain by store count, drives in generators to power its stores. When that's impossible, it relies on tractor-trailers converted into pharmacies to serve customers. The company has 50 trailers, moving them about the country. After Katrina smashed New Orleans, CVS moved trailers to the Astrodome sports stadium in Houston and elsewhere to get prescriptions to evacuees. "If they can't remember their insurance plan, if they can't find their prescriptions, if all they know is that they take a little blue pill for heart trouble, the CVS pharmacists on board will track down the right medication and dispense it," said Eileen Howard Dunn, the chain's corporate communications vice president. Shaw's has a three-tiered power system, with generators that can keep food safe until refrigerated trucks or trailer-sized generators can arrive or permanent power is restored. Coffee-shop chain Dunkin' Donuts worries a lot about water -- not the kind flowing over a riverbank, but the kind flowing through pipes. Contaminated water supplies make it dangerous to brew coffee, said Ron Cumbee, the company's director of franchise services for Florida. "There are a lot of implications that go along with that," Cumbee said. Dunkin' shops close whenever a government agency issues a "boil water" alert for their community, he said. After an alert is lifted, the shops must replace water filters and flush lines that feed coffee and drink machines before reopening. Newspapers, supermarkets and drugstores are all transportation-intensive businesses, so fuel becomes an issue -- where to get it and what you have to pay for it. Some companies keep reserve tanks at distribution centers or rely on contracts with fuel companies to keep trucks rolling. But the average person doesn't have that luxury, putting pressure on oil companies and gas-and-go convenience chains. "We have a whole system that tracks people to make sure we can get them back into the stores as quickly as possible," said Rick Lawlor, a Hess Corp. vice president. The company runs about 150 gas stations in New England, including 20 in Rhode Island. "We're working with our partners to make sure we have plenty of product on hand," Lawlor said. Damaged refineries and clogged roads squeeze gasoline supplies. "It gets extremely complicated from a retail perspective," said Lenard, of the convenience store association. Prices rise and charges of gouging often follow. But higher prices can dampen demand, keeping stations open and gas available, theoretically, to more people. Rationing supplies at the pump invites unrest, Lawlor said. "I always am nervous about putting my employees on the front line in a rationing situation," he said. Simply getting to a bank, a store or a gas station can be difficult, planners say. After Katrina, Wal-Mart struggled to supply stores around New Orleans because truck drivers didn't have the credentials to get past police checkpoints. Washington Trust picked up on such lessons. The bank is working with Rhode Island officials to get state-approved emergency ID cards for key workers. It's handing out laminated cards with critical phone numbers to employees. But planning, policies and procedures carry businesses only so far, said Restivo, the Wal-Mart executive. Mother Nature, he said, can teach something even to the world's largest retailer. Hurricane Katrina taught the Arkansas company to "understand our capabilities" and "manage expectations," Restivo said. For Shaw's Supermarkets, "The perfect storm is the one that doesn't come," said Ed Rodericks, a trucking manager at the grocery chain.
pgrimald@projo.com
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