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LETTER
FROM THE EDITOR
Already 2005.
First and foremost, the entire Bleutec team wishes
all of you health, prosperity, and success for
2005.
You will notice from our
first edition of the year that we’ve been
pretty busy. January started with Bleutec’s
Christmas party, the following week was Promat,
then followed the introduction of our new “heavy
duty series” mini-catalogue.
Please take a few moments
to read through the leader, as you will learn
about a sport that is still not well known.  Look
out for future editions of the leader as we will
have some surprises for you!
Signed,
Luc Turcotte
Editor
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OUR
RECENT TRIP TO EUROPE
While most of my travel
destinations remain within North America, Luc,
(our general manager) and I recently went to
Europe, so I thought I’d write a short
article about our trip.
 As
most of our readers know, Bleutec’s major
supplier, Guitel, is located in France, and
I accompanied Luc to visit Guitel and their
distribution centre. We flew into Paris on a
foggy Sunday morning in November. Our hotel
rooms were not available until 1:30 pm, so we
did a little “Paris sight seeing’’.
The picture/caster nut that I am took advantage
of the many great “photo ops”.
Our Novoplex caster with Notre Dame De Paris
Cathedral in the background
Quick lunch in a typical Paris café
Our first business stop
on the Monday was at Point M, Guitel’s
distribution centre, where Bleutec orders most
of its caster components: expanders, hardware,
rigs and wheels. Point M basically receives
from Guitel’s manufacturing facilities
located throughout France, assembles casters
and reships them to their customers and subsidiaries.
Caster assembly line at Point M
Our second
destination was Germany. As you may have read
in our December edition, Bleutec has added a
new supplier to its lineup : BLICKLE Räder+Rollen.
You can read and see more of BLICKLE in my article
about the new HEAVY DUTY catalogue.
We did
not have much time for sightseeing in Germany,
but Mr. Blickle himself did a wonderful job
to convey his love for his beloved province,
Baden Wüttemberg, which is located in southern
Germany.
German province of Baden-Würtemberg
On
the business side of things, I can’t find
any other way to describe the last part of our
trip, but to say IMPRESSIVE!!!! I mean this
in many ways: impressive in the way we were
greeted and treated, and I take this opportunity
to thank Mr. Blickle and his team for their
warm welcome to their Rosenfeld facility.
Be on the lookout for the next edition of the
LEADER.COM, as I plan to write alot more about
BLICKLE, the organization, its people and the
products they proudly manufacture.
Frederic
Lagace |
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HEAVY
DUTY CATALOGUE
In our
continuous effort to stay ahead and be the LEADER,
we are proud to present to you our most recent
catalogue, HEAVY DUTY SERIES.
This latest
addition to our exisiting volumes presents high
quality and engineered casters from a German
manufacturer, Blickle.
You will
find casters rated as high as 6,600 lbs of weight
capacity. Also included is a 1 3/8 inch caster
rated at 220 lbs. Unique wheel materials such
Blickle’s SofthaneTM polyurethane and
cast nylon wheels are displayed.
Intrigued
? Be on the lookout for our next edition of
THE LEADER.COM as I will write
more about Blickle’s innovative products.
Make
sure to ask us for a copy of our Heavy Duty
Series catalogue by e-mail at leader@bleutec.com
or by telephone at 1-888-558-7878.
Please do not hesitate to visit Blickle’s
web site at www.blickle.de.
Frederic
Lagace |
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CHANGING
THE ROUTINE
In the
past, Bleutec had an unwritten rule
about the company’s Christmas
parties. The company would offer
the employees a supper with hotel
room and brunch in the morning.
This
year, we chose to add a little outdoor
winter workout to the above mentioned
routine. The entire Bleutec team
and their families were invited
to arrive at a hotel on a Friday
evening in January. This hotel was
located in a town called St-Jean-De-Matha,
which is approximately 100 km (60
miles) north of Montreal.
The main event
took place on Saturday as most of
us went ‘’tube sliding’’
(sliding down a snow covered hill
on air filled truck tire tubes).
This
was a new activity for the kids
and I, and we had the best time.
In all, it was a very different
kind of Christmas party and a very
enjoyable one at that. I take this
opportunity to thank everyone that
was involved in organizing it.
Frederic
Lagace |
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Promat 2005!
After
months of preparation, Promat, North America’s
largest material handling show, is once again
behind us.
We just came back from
Chicago, where Bleutec was amongst the 700 exhibitors.
The final count of attendees is not in yet,
but MHIA (Material Handling Industry of America)
predicts that about 25,000 people walked the
show during the 4 days.
Promat was a very good
show for us. To start off, our new booth concept
made quite an impact (thanks to Guy at EDI-Expo
Design). We had a great corner location and
we made many heads turn with our new Blickle
casters, especially the 22,000 lb. capacity
caster!
Just as at the last Promat
in 2003, our Resilex™ caster made the
pages of the Show Daily journal. Even though
Bleutec has been synonymous with Resilex™
for years in Canada, it’s now being recognized
in the U.S. Akro-Mils even had a few carts equipped
with our Resilex™ casters in their booth!
Here a few pictures
from last week, and if you have any questions
about the show, please don't hesitate to call
us. If you have any questions about the booth
or need ideas for your booth or upcoming shows,
drop Guy a line at guyl@ediexpo.com.
Resilex in the Show Daily
Blickle's 22,000 lb capacity caster
Nancy
Allen
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GRAY
SANDWICH
Guitel recently informed
us of an overstock of 4’’ grey Sandwich
wheels. Interested ?
 Please
contact us to find out about price and quantities
available.
Frederic Lagace
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Distributor
of the month:
Tenaquip
We are
pleased and proud to present to you Tenaquip,
another important partner in Bleutec’s
growth and development.
Founded in 1968, Tenaquip
was the first Canadian company to sell industrial
products through a catalogue. 30 years later,
Tenaquip is still at the forefront of the
Canadian industrial market. Their corporate
philosophy of innovation, initiative, and
creativity guarantee high work standards.
Finally, their investment in knowledge and
technology help Tenaquip maintain the competitive
advantage in their industry.
| Industrial
Buyer’s Guide
Their 1,792-page Industrial Buyer’s
Guide is recognized as the premiere
source for industrial equipment and
supplies in Canada. |
With
8 branch locations throughout Quebec and Ontario,
Tenaquip has quite the presence. Each branch
is considered a retail store in order to better
serve the local markets.
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| Ringette
I take pleasure to
introduce to you my daughter, Marie-Eve.
Marie-Eve is a real sportswoman,
in all senses of the word. First of all, she
is 15 years old and already measures 5’9”.
Secondly, she’s always excelled in sports
on ice rinks.
Since the age of 5 years
old, Marie-Eve’s been playing ringette.
How did she make this choice? Well, just as
some of us, she didn’t know what ringette
was when we asked her if she wanted to play
hockey or ringette. We therefore explained to
her that she’d wear the same equipment
as in hockey, that she’d only be with
girls, and that ringette was faster than hockey
because you use a straight stick to manoeuvre
the rubber ring to score goals. Because of all
that, ringette is more about skating, passing,
and shooting, and she decided to try it. Since
then, she’s been crazy about ringette.
Due to Marie-Eve’s
size, she’s excelled at the game, and
often had to pay the price because the referees
would give her penalties. Today, the difference
in size is not as noticeable and this has permitted
her to exercise her talent to the maximum of
her capabilities.
She’s a team girl
and has never put her personal achievements
before the team’s. I suppose that is what
makes ringette somewhat magical – none
of the girls see themselves playing in the NHL.
The girls finish their game, don’t know
how many goals or passes they have made - what
counts for them is the result at the end of
the game.
This year, Marie-Eve is
playing for the South Shore’s Junior AA
team (14-15 year olds). They play against teams
from Lake St. Louis, Gatineau, Nepean, Montreal,
and Lanaudiere. It’s high calibre play.
Also, she substitutes for players for the Cadette
AA team (16-17-18 year olds).
She’ll participate
in her first Jeux du Quebec in March 2005 and
the winning team will represent Quebec at the
Canadian Championship in April. Also, she’s
been selected to participate at the provincial
team’s training camp for the Canada Games
to be held in Whitehorse in 2007.
All in all, Marie-Eve’s
very active and keeps herself busy. Her school,
sports, and training don’t give her much
free time for herself or her parents. We do
get to enjoy some time with her in the car as
we drive to the games, so basically we get “family
time” during the drive to the rink.
We encourage her to continue
in ringette as long as she’d like to,
as there are many adult ringette leagues.
After all, as Marie-Eve
says so well, “ringette, if it was so
easy, they’d call it hockey!”.
Robert Hamelin
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DON'T FORGET TO WRITE US...
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HAPPY
VALENTINE'S DAY!
Setup and design of The Leader.Com by Karine.
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LEADER.COM