With more than 30 years of experience in developing rescue hoists and winches for helicopter applications, Ronin designed the Power Ascender to keep tower technicians safe and reduce climber fatigue. SAC Wireless was in Ronin’s target market because its tower crews climb hundreds of feet in the air every day to build new telecom structures and perform network maintenance, upgrades, and enhancements.
“We were the first company in the wireless industry to deploy the Ronin Lift nationwide, because workplace safety is our number one core value,” Chris Bondurant, CEO, SAC Wireless, told Inside Towers.
It took a powerful distributor, GME Supply, to swiftly get the Ronin Lift Power Ascender from the manufacturer into the hands of SAC technicians nationwide. Ronin brought the Lift Power Ascender to market in 2018 and began selling through GME Supply in 2019 when the distributor identified it as a viable solution for critical issues many of their customers face. “The Ronin Lift was designed to keep workers safe and productive while on the job site, so it aligned with our goals,” said Dave Coble, National Accounts Manager, GME Supply.
“One of the most important relationships for a manufacturer to be successful is partnering with good distribution,” Bryant Bertrand, CEO, Ronin, said. “We rely on our distributors to be that first point of contact with the customer, providing superior service.”
Ronin has a national office in Placentia, CA, while GME has six training centers and seven fulfillment centers across North America in every time zone, which can deliver equipment to every job site within 24 hours. “GME Supply has the ability to provide customer care and service at a level that a national company would need and expect,” Bertrand said.
“We make ourselves available to anyone in the market to call us and ask us questions,” Coble explained. GME Supply prides itself on maintaining excellent communication with manufacturers and its customers in the field. It worked very closely with Ronin to develop a strategy for rolling out the product across North America to each of the markets SAC Wireless serves.
“We take feedback from SAC Wireless on what products and accessories they would like for each market and work with Ronin to ship orders to SAC field crews,” Coble said. “We are an extension of Ronin and an extension of the end user.”
Ronin provides more than just the Power Ascender. The kit can include the Marlow Ronin HP Kernmantle Rope, the Ronin Lift Bollard, the Ronin Rubber Motor Cover Protector, the Ronin Rope Brush, and the Ronin ResQmax Rope Launcher Kit, among other items.
GME Supply does more than just ship equipment. By offering continued training and expertise on the products they sell, they become experts when it comes to the gear they sell.
“How are people supposed to safely use a device like that? We don’t just put an order together, send it down to our warehouse and ship it out. We’re also here to answer questions, offer training and troubleshoot issues,” Coble said.
For Bondurant, benefits of the SAC Wireless relationship with Ronin and GME Supply is multi-layered. “Along with improving safety and longevity on the tower, the Ronin Lift improves technician performance and productivity. Climbing a tower may take anywhere from 15 minutes to two hours, one way, to get to the top. With a Ronin Lift, it takes four minutes,” he said. “As more technicians in the tower industry use this technology, we’ll see transformative changes.”
If SAC Wireless can do a job in three and a half days with the Ronin Lift Power Ascender instead of five days, that adds up when spread across thousands of projects. “Success is about safety, first and foremost, but increased productivity, improved focus, and days shaved off each tower build will yield significant results,” Bondurant said. “The Ronin Lift helps us truly deliver upon the refreshed company mission and tagline we recently unveiled, ‘Innovative Designs, Precisely Deployed.’”
It takes a perfect triangle of the manufacturer, distributor, and customers to get an innovative product like the Ronin Lift Power Ascender out in an evolving marketplace. You can now find one on every truck at every tower site where an SAC Wireless tower crew is at work.
“There has to be a lot of trust among the three to make this all come together,” Bertrand said. “It takes all of us working together with a common vision to help bring this kind of technology forward.”
For more information, contact GME Supply at [email protected] or Ronin at https://roninpowerascender.com/.
By J. Sharpe Smith, Inside Towers Technology Editor
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