With office products sales tailing off, few in the IDC would argue the need to diversify. The question is which category to turn to. Janitorial supplies has been an obvious choice for many dealers—some organically, others as a response to the COVID-19 pandemic. So, for those who have entered the janitorial supply (jan/san) arena, has the move paid off?
Arrow Office Supply Co., Detroit, Michigan, began selling janitorial supplies about 10 years ago, but the pandemic heightened its focus on the category. “We saw the writing on the wall with COVID-19 and brought in a lot of jan/san inventory,” recalls partner and owner Marc Crane. “We became the go-to source for jan/san products for our customers who couldn’t get what they needed from other places.”
Since the pandemic, not only has Arrow continued to stock jan/san; its reps now lead with it. “The office products industry has been stagnant or declining and our name is Arrow Office Supply, so people know we sell office products,” says Crane. “They might not know that we sell janitorial products, so our salespeople lead with that. Carrying jan/san products has helped accelerate our growth.”
Arrow’s top-stocked items include toilet paper, towels, soap, hand sanitizer and trashcan liners. The company buys these from Essendant and directly from some manufacturers through ISG.
Office Products Alliance (OPA), Kansas City, Missouri, has sold jan/san products since 1993 but “really ramped up its focus on it about five years ago,” says president Mark Whitlow. “COVID-19 threw us into the pool and we came out realizing we really need to be here.” So, four years ago, OPA hired a jan/san specialist with 30 years of experience who could hit the ground running. And run he has: while pre-pandemic, Whitlow estimates jan/san accounted for four to five percent of the company’s sales, today that figure stands at between 20 and 25 percent. The top sellers include paper towels, toilet paper, paper dispensers and trashcan liners.
OPA buys some of its jan/san products from S.P. Richards, but most are purchased direct from manufacturers, half of which it has found through ISG. “There’s a price level you must hit to be competitive,” explains Whitlow. “You can’t compete in the space with competitive pricing. Going direct fueled our growth.”
The pandemic is also why Stationers Inc., Huntington, West Virginia—with annual sales of $35 million—got into jan/san. “Customers were asking for items they couldn’t get during COVID-19 that we could supply,” recalls president Justin Carpenter. “We discovered it was very lucrative, so we figured, ‘Why not?’ We started with basic, easy things like paper towels and toilet paper in 2022. We took baby steps and used our existing wholesalers, like S.P. Richards, that had experienced jan/san people on staff. Last year, we started expanding into more items. We started buying direct from manufacturers through ISG and jan/san wholesalers such as RJ Schinner for better pricing. I am on the board of ISG and Frank Hoard [ISG facility supply channel director] is a great resource. Once we grow the business large enough to support one, we will hire a jan/san specialist. But Frank has been invaluable. He helped us go after larger medical facilities, selling things like dilution systems and industrial supplies. We even brought Frank in to walk through hospitals. We’ve experienced 30 percent growth in the category and recently secured a contract with a 100-bed rehabilitation clinic that had been using Cintas.”
According to Carpenter, Stationers’ largest customers are in healthcare and banking—mainly because these make up the largest existing customer base in the company’s other categories: “With our office products and furniture, we tell customers we are already doing two out of three and emphasize the convenience of having one order, one invoice delivered daily.”
At Eakes Office Solutions, Grand Island, Nebraska, jan/san currently accounts for about 15 percent of overall sales—a percentage Timur Aydinli, Eakes’ janitorial division manager, expects will climb. The company’s biggest customers are in education, manufacturing, healthcare and building service contracting. Unlike for many dealers, however, the stronger focus on jan/san was not pandemic driven. “We started selling the category 10 years ago because some of our existing customers were looking for jan/san items,” explains Aydinli. “We hired our first specialist nine years ago. We currently have 11 specialists and 23 office product reps capable of selling jan/san.”
According to Aydinli, the company’s jan/san reps are certified and receive ongoing training for a reason: “Office products and jan/san call for different sales skills. With jan/san, you have responsibility. You need technical knowledge. You need to know the makeup of chemicals and what works on what surfaces. Sales reps need product knowledge about anything they sell. However, chemicals can be dangerous if you don’t supply customers with the necessary education about the product or the right personal protective equipment. Reps need to be educated and have ongoing training because the responsibility of selling jan/san is at a whole different level than other products.”
Having specialists has also helped Eakes expand its offerings. “We are a full-solution jan/san supplier,” says Aydinli. “We offer paper and chemicals. We do a large volume in sweepers, vacuums and other equipment.” As for suppliers: “We buy from wholesalers like RJ Schinner and R-3 Redistribution, as well as S.P. Richards and Essendant. But 70 to 80 percent of our jan/san we buy direct from manufacturers, including ones we find through ISG.”
Aydinli is a big fan of buying direct: “It gives us better customer service and training and field support. It allows us to establish relationships with manufacturers and get better pricing, which helps us build relationships with customers.”
Beyond the ordinary
When it comes to products, this category proves to be a particularly broad church. “It depends on what you consider jan/san, but some of the more unique requests we’ve received at OPA include 500 of those burners that caterers use to keep the food warm on a buffet and the toothpicks that hold the olives in a martini,” says Whitlow. “Many conglomerates would say they don’t have an item and leave the customer with the pain of finding it. But the word ‘no’ never comes out of our mouths. If we know what they want, we’ll get it. It’s not difficult—it just takes some extra time and effort. I think that is one of the advantages of being an independent dealer. We put the extra time and effort into finding what customers need. Those items won’t be huge sales, but they help the relationship. Customers want a one-stop shop.”
Stationers is similarly selling products the company never even considered when moving into jan/san as a category. “When we walked through with Frank, we found there was much more to jan/san than we thought,” Carpenter recalls. “Shampoo, conditioner, health-grade dilution systems, pads for floor buffers, laundry detergent … For people in a rehabilitation center for 90 days, going to the laundromat is not part of the program!”
Facing the challenges
Jan/san is also a category that is under less pressure from Amazon than most, suggests Aydinli: “We benefit from having our feet on the street, customer support and next-day delivery with no minimum. And we are less worried in jan/san—Amazon doesn’t provide any support or education, and there are many things, like chemicals, people can’t buy online. Few people will go online and outfit a whole facility with dispensers or laundry, ware wash, drain maintenance or laundry supplies.”
Arrow’s Crane nonetheless acknowledges that office product dealers selling jan/san face their own issues. “The worst thing you can hear a customer say is, ‘I didn’t know you sold that,’” he says. “Also, a different level of knowledge is required and going against jan/san houses to get large dispenser contracts from manufacturers like Kimberly-Clark or Georgia Pacific can be difficult.”
For Carpenter at Stationers, the biggest challenge is education: “There’s a knowledge gap. We can’t expect our sales and customer service teams to be immediate experts. We sell too many products for that, and our tenured sales reps have been selling the same categories for a long time. The second challenge is getting the reps confident enough to introduce jan/san to their accounts that are already doing well; not to be afraid something could go wrong and sour the account.”
Reaping the benefits
Despite these issues, all the dealers interviewed believe they are far outweighed by the benefits.
“Our growth in jan/san at Arrow is in the double digits,” enthuses Crane. “The orders are larger, with better margins, and customers are less likely to price shop on Amazon for jan/san than they are for office products. It’s a different buyer. Instead of coming in the front door, you are coming in the back door, dealing with facility managers and maintenance personnel who are more likely to look for service. And we have an advantage because we deliver next day, whereas most traditional jan/san companies deliver on a set schedule.”
Whitlow believes selling jan/san has fueled growth for OPA in other areas. “Jan/san opens the door to other categories,” he explains. “The main verticals we sell to are manufacturing, hotels and entertainment. We started doing food service about 18 months ago. We got connected to a lot of hotels through jan/san and many of them wanted to talk about food service. Once you get the relationship started, it goes from there.”
For Aydinli, “Selling jan/san made sense for us at Eakes because it fits into our business model. We had the technology and next-day delivery, so it was a seamless transition with instant benefits. And the beauty of jan/san is that it’s a necessity, a staple. Every customer needs the products. Also, it depends on whether or not the product is a commodity, like paper or can liners. For those, the pricing can be competitive, but generally the margins are higher than on office products.”
Indeed, these margins have helped the Stationers team become more comfortable selling jan/san. “The margins are a lot lower in office products, so when the reps see the jan/san margins, they are excited to make more money,” reports Carpenter. “It also allows us to be a one-stop shop and compete with Amazon. Our reps can walk in and say, ‘We do it all.’ And it’s not just pricing—they can articulate the overall cost and time savings of having one vendor with one customer service person, rep and invoice. It helps us and it helps the customer.”
Ready, set, go!
For those dealers keen to dip their toes into new waters, these jan/san trailblazers have some sage counsel.
“If you want to grow, buy direct from manufacturers,” advises OPA’s Whitlow. “Wholesalers have a good product mix, but the pricing isn’t good enough for the category. Buying direct means stocking and adding inventory adds expense, but no risk, no reward. Also, know your competition in your unique areas. Are there big players in your backyard? Are there a lot of small jan/san suppliers? If you buy direct, you can compete because maybe some of the smaller dealers cannot; you need to know your competition. Every independent dealer needs to diversify to stay relevant. There are many ways to diversify, but office products are shrinking. Jan/san is growing, so it’s a first step to stay relevant. Also, ensure you stay updated on technology to provide a good user experience.”
Carpenter recommends following in Stationers’ footsteps: “Start with simple things. You don’t have to be a $30 million company to get into things like soap, hand sanitizer, toilet paper and paper towels. You can get them for a reasonably competitive price from S.P. Richards and Essendant, and they have janitorial experts to help. Sell first to your existing customer base. Once your reps are more comfortable and you have the resources and want more volume, don’t be afraid to bring in help from your groups like ISG to help you take it to the next level.”
Crane suggests there’s no reason for other dealers to hesitate: “Jump right in and get the sales staff to buy in and start pushing it. The way the industry is going, it’s necessary for independent dealers to become proficient at selling jan/san.”
Eakes’ Aydinli believes success in the category “comes down to being willing to build out a good jan/san program, invest in ongoing education and training, and find specialists with knowledge. I can’t stress enough the responsibility aspect of selling jan/san. Laundry services in hospitals and infection prevention are real responsibilities. However, there are benefits for independent dealers that build the infrastructure. It’s another category to diversify into. Everyone needs it and integrating it into an existing office products website is easy. It’s a way to move toward becoming a one-stop shop. Also, it may not seem glamourous, but it’s a chance to provide solutions that keep people safe and healthy and their facilities clean. It’s pretty exciting and it’s fun.”