1966 Sears Excellence Award

Recently, the presentation of a Sears Symbol of Excellence was made to your division. At that time, it was physically impossible to have everyone present who was responsible for attaining this award.

Today, speaking for Jim Reeves, the national senior buyer of combination and wringer washers, and for myself, I would like to take advantage of this opportunity to thank you for your part in helping your division win this high honor. If it were possible, I would prefer to speak with you in small groups over a cup of coffee, as you are now assembled, but that simply isn’t practical. I’m also not sure I could drink that much coffee.

I’ve been given five minutes to talk with you. Realistically, no sales buyer can be limited to five minutes when discussing his product, so to make sure I don’t overlook any major points, I’ve made a few notes.

First, let me explain the Sears Symbol of Excellence award that you have just seen. It is a great pleasure to honor you and your company for your outstanding performance in supplying superior products to Sears during the past year. I have come to present you with the highest award Sears can give to any supplier—the Sears Symbol of Excellence.

This symbol is our way of telling you that we are grateful for the excellent job you are doing. It is also our way of recognizing the direct contribution you are making to Sears’ reputation for quality merchandise.

Sears obtains merchandise from about 20,000 manufacturers, including more than 10,000 major sources. This award singles you out as one of the top 180 suppliers among those 10,000 whose efficiency, workmanship, quality standards, and dependability of supply have been most outstanding during 1965.

Let me briefly describe how your award came about. First, it was our pleasure to nominate you. Then a special committee studied the nomination. The committee surveyed our general merchandise personnel, a number of our retail stores, catalog plants, and our merchandise testing and development laboratory. Using a number of measurements, they all had to agree that the job you have done has been outstanding.

You may be wondering what those measurements involved. The answer is very simple: quality. The quality of goods and the quality of supply. Primarily, this award is based on the merchandise you have produced for Sears.

Second, it is based on the general excellence of your performance in such areas as shipping goods on schedule, providing merchandise free from service or replacement problems, maintaining a minimum of customer returns, and showing initiative in developing new and improved merchandise.

At this point, I would like to repeat something you have heard many times before, but it still bears repeating. More than ever before, the keystone to successful retailing is quality. Quality of materials, quality of workmanship, quality of performance after purchase, and quality of dependable supply.

Today, customers are more quality-conscious than ever before. The word “quality” is certainly not new to our vocabulary. In the years I have worked with the people at Whirlpool—both inside and outside the plant—I have rarely had a conversation that didn’t eventually turn to the subject of quality.

I don’t need to dwell on the vital role each of you plays when it comes to quality. You cannot simply add quality to a product as it leaves the shipping room, and you know that.

The mission of Sears is to bring more goods of greater value to more people at lower cost. Our success depends entirely on the ability of our suppliers to provide superior goods. Several years ago, George H. Brothers, our Vice President in charge of merchandising, said it this way when speaking to a national magazine:

“Without the character, talents, and ability of our suppliers, we might as well be operating in a public square as traders.”

We value our suppliers, and we value our relationship with them. Sears’ relationship with Whirlpool is truly a partnership between producer and distributor. That partnership is built first on mutual respect and confidence—not only at the management level, but throughout the entire plant.

This confidence is so strong that there is no written contract between Sears and Whirlpool. I believe this was the original intention when this partnership was formed by Lou Upton and General Wood several years ago. I have seen it grow over the approximately fifteen years that I have been associated with you.

Together we have developed teamwork based on mutual understanding, cooperation, loyalty, and trust. Speaking personally and on behalf of Sears, we treasure this relationship. We are grateful for the excellent work each and every one of you is doing.

We look forward to many more years of success and prosperity together. The continued success and future growth of Sears depend on the abilities of you and our other suppliers, just as they depend on the performance of our selling organization. This interdependence between Sears and its suppliers has existed for years and is a cornerstone of our joint success. We have been good for each other.

That was our way of life in 1965. The question now is what we can accomplish together in 1966 and 1967. Our past record has been strong, and as a result we continue to be leaders in the industry. But I can assure you that somewhere, right now, one or more of our competitors is meeting to figure out how to beat Kenmore. This is no secret. They have been doing it for years, and competition today is more determined than ever.

This situation is not new to us. It has become a way of life. From my own experience spending more than three years on production lines and in quality control before joining Sears, I know that each of you has already set personal standards in your work. You understand the concept of quality and your individual responsibility in the overall effort to maintain it.

It is a real challenge when you realize that every machine that passes your station must eventually be accepted in a household as a quality investment—one that the owner can be proud of.

Let me be very honest. We must not only maintain our present standards; we must improve them. Our competitors are doing exactly that today.

Of course, this is a two-way street. You have every right to ask: if we do this for Sears, what will Sears do for us? As some of you know, Sears has been on a remarkable expansion program. During 1966 and 1967 we plan to open a new Sears store at the rate of one each week. That should give you some insight into the confidence Sears has in its suppliers.

Sears is on the move, and we are counting on you to move with us.

In summary, there are three guiding principles we must follow if we are to grow together:

1. We must maintain and improve the quality of our products.
2. We must maintain and improve the supply of merchandise from the factory.
3. We must continue to provide the American housewife with the greatest laundry value in the industry.

Thank you very much for your time, and thanks for the coffee.