News Briefs

A great deal of smoke and mirrors happens in the legislative process both in Washington, D.C, and in our state legislature. One of the shadiest practices is the process of marking items with ‘tbl'. This is insider shorthand for ‘trailer bill language.' In recent years, ‘trailer bills' have proliferated because they have become handy vehicles for enacting policy changes without the scrutiny or public input normally accorded regular bills.

Trailer bills are usually drafted in secret just days, or sometimes hours, before they are presented for floor votes in both legislative houses. Note that there is no hearing on these bills. The devil is often in the details and the actual effect of this legislation may not become apparent until after it has passed. Thus, the trailer bill process is often a game of hide the pea...or catch me if you can.

Enter the pest control industry this year. Thanks to the diligence of our legislative advocacy team, a trailer bill was found with language that would have allowed every city and county to regulate pesticides. It would have eliminated the current state pre-emption statute which mandates that only the state (through DPR) can regulate pesticides in California based on proven scientific evidence.

Immediately after we found out about this trailer bill, PCOC went in to high gear: we pulled out all the stops and contacts that we have. We helped form a coalition of business groups who were also opposed to eliminating state pre-emption.

I am happy to report that the language was taken out of the final version of the budget. Reason prevailed, for once. Still, it is a salutary reminder of how quickly and how undemocratically things can go sideways in the legislative process. It also confirms the fact that PCOC needs to remain ever vigilant and remain a strong force in Sacramento in order to protect the industry.

SURVEY OF IPM IN CHILDCARE

PCOC is working with the the UC Berkeley Center for Environmental Research and Children's Health (CERCH), the UC Integrated Pest Management Program (UC IPM), and the California Department of Pesticide Regulation (DPR) to bring more integrated pest management (IPM) information to pest management professionals working in California.

We are conducting an online survey to collect information about current pest management practices and identify education and outreach needs regarding IPM in child care environments. All information will be kept confidential. The survey should not take more than 10-15 minutes.

Thank you for your ongoing contribution to making children's environments safer and for participating in this survey. Click here to begin.

The 2013-2014 Legislative Session of the California Legislature is in progress. Click here for PCOC's Legislative Agenda.

 MARKETING TIPS FOR THE SERVICE INDUSTRY

It is proven that in times of hardship successful companies do not abandon their marketing strategies they adapt them. Here is a quick guide to the things you can implement to make sure your business survives the recession.

1. The potential that lies in existing customers

Your best immediate source of additional profits and increased business are your existing customers. These are the people you have already invested time, energy and money to create a relationship. It is usually between five to ten times easier to get an existing customer to buy from you again, than it is to get someone to buy from you for the first time. Prospects in particular are more likely to become customers if your marketing efforts are complimented by a recommendation from a friend or family member.

TIP: You can encourage your existing customers to attract new customers for you by undertaking a ‘recommend a friend' as part of your promotional efforts. For example, you could send out an offer where your existing client and their friend will both receive a discount when they book a treatment together.

2. Developing a marketing strategy

Growth has nothing to do with the size of your business. It's about how many customers and prospects you can market to. This is not the time to cut marketing spend. It is well documented that businesses who increase advertising during a recession, when competitors are cutting back, can improve market share at lower cost than during good economic times. You need to be aware that marketing efforts require careful planning and, in order for you to assess your return on investment and effectively plan future marketing, you must keep a record of the sales generated as a result of your campaigns. Try to set some time aside each week for brainstorming new ideas or calculating your business growth.

TIP: There are, however, ways to market more cost effectively, perhaps by reducing your ad space or by sending out promotional SMS messages which reach customers cheaply, directly and quickly.

3. The power of the Internet

Many businesses still do not collect the email addresses of everyone who contacts them. Every time a business fails to capture someone's email address, they're turning down the opportunity to contact them for FREE, for weeks, months and years ahead. Once you have Email Addresses – use them!

TIP: You can use email to thank people for their business, make them a special offer, give them a free article or report, send a newsletter, or recommend a product or service they may be interested in or ask for referrals.

Technology helps to simplify working life, yet many businesses are reluctant to adopt new forms of communication. Consider the impact of a website showing photos of all your best work, compared to a simple price list or leaflet.

4. Advertising

It is essential that you measure the response to all of your advertising in order to evaluate whether or not it represented a viable investment and to shape your future investment decisions. It is worth asking how many people responded to your ad, how many of those were converted to a sale, what's that worth to you? Some practical advice: an attention grabbing headline is essential; one change in headline can produce a 50 to 100 percent increase in response. The ad itself needs to appeal directly to the interests of your target audience. People don't buy your product or service. They buy the benefits that your product or service offers them. They buy things and services that satisfy their wants or needs or solve their problems, so spend some time getting clear on what exactly your benefits are – and then make sure that you articulate them precisely in all of your communications.

TIP: Research has shown that the effects of advertising are short lived. Therefore, in order to optimize your budget, it makes sense to spend smaller amounts very regularly. This will ensure that your business is consistently at the forefront of customer's minds.

5. Promotions

Customers will be shopping around for the best deals. You do not necessarily have to cut list prices, but you may need to offer more temporary price promotions. Targeted and personalized promotions are more cost efficient than just sending out one generic campaign. Customers are sometimes skeptical of promotions so make sure you frame them appropriately, for example if there is a holiday make the promotion reflect the holiday.

TIP: It is worth noting that discounts below 15 percent are often ineffective

6. Rewarding loyalty

Start a loyalty program. The customer gets a good deal, you get a happy customer. Remember, people are more likely to buy from someone they like. A simple approach is to give clients a free treatment after they purchase a set number of treatments. Invite your regulars to try new products and treatments at a reduced cost. You could target this promotion based on a customer's purchase history. TIP: Customers can be dubious of sales offers so frame the offer as a "thank you" for their loyalty.

ENTOMOLOGY CERTIFICATION

BECOME AN ASSOCIATE CERTIFIED ENTOMOLOGIST! Training and testing for becoming an ACE with the Entomological Society of America is scheduled at Univar in Commerce AUGUST 29, 30. There may also be a future class in Sacramento. Contact Laurie Jo Jensen, BCE for information: laurie@bugwizzards.com, 949-412-8773 or http://www.bugwizzards.com/

Welcome to a new section of Newsbriefs! Here we will be giving news from our members: new hires, retirements, etc. If you have some news you would like to share, please send a short sentence or two to jenai@pcoc.org.

Visit http://www.naylornetwork.com/cpc-nwl/pdf/Endorsed_Programs.pdf to view the full article online.

Fatigue can cause lost productivity and accidents. This problem affects nearly 40 percent of U.S. workers from time to time, according to a study published in the Journal of Occupational and Environmental Medicine.

Fatigued workers lose an average of 5.6 work hours per week, compared to 3.3 hours for those without fatigue. Even when working, workers with fatigue symptoms had much lower rates of productivity than their sprightly counterparts – mainly due to low concentration and increased time needed to accomplish tasks.

Perhaps more importantly, fatigue can lead to accidents. Clockwork Consultants, a UK-based company that helps enterprises manage fatigue risk, reports that fatigued employees are three times more likely to have an accident at work.

How Fatigue Affects Safety

Why are fatigued employees more likely to be involved in accidents? An article in the New York Times described a sleep restriction study at the Sleep and Chronobiology Laboratory at the Hospital at University of Pennsylvania. Researchers measured subjects' attentiveness while performing a repetitive task. Subjects who had eight hours of sleep nightly over the 14-day study performed well, with hardly any attention lapses or cognitive declines. In subjects who had four or six hours of sleep nightly, performance declined steadily over the course of the study. Members of both groups did steadily worse on memory tests as the study progressed, and a significant number of even those who had gotten six hours of sleep nightly were falling asleep on task.

The conclusion? Individuals vary in their tolerance to sleeplessness, but workers who consistently get less than eight hours of sound sleep per night could be working at less than peak attention and therefore be more accident-prone.

Fighting the Fatigue Factor

Many safety-critical occupations have strict rules about how long a worker can stay on the job and how long breaks must be. Productivity experts recommend similar guidelines for most jobs. If extended hours/ overtime are common, managers should calculate the time required for the commute home, meal preparation, eating and socializing with family when calculating employees' work shifts. Workplaces may also provide on-site accommodations, prepared meals for workers and facilities where employees can take a nap when they are tired.

Proper working conditions can also reduce the risk of fatigue. Fatigue is increased by dim lighting or other limited visual conditions (e.g., due to weather), high temperatures, high noise, high comfort, tasks that must be sustained for long periods of time, and monotonous work tasks. Eliminating such conditions and providing environments that have good lighting, comfortable temperatures and reasonable noise levels quickly pay for themselves in reduced risk, according to a study by the Canadian Centre of Occupational Health and Safety (COHS). If possible, work tasks should also provide a variety of interest and tasks should change throughout the shift.

Organizations should adopt a variety of methods to make themselves "fatigue safe." The most common include:

-Training workers to help them understand their personal levels of fatigue

-Developing "fatigue safe" work schedules that comply with applicable regulations

-Developing fatigue risk management policies and procedures

-Using fatigue models to investigate fatigue-related accidents

-Appointing committees to oversee fatigue management programs.

For more suggestions on reducing fatigue-related accidents in the workplace, please contact the PCOC Insurance Program department of Jenkins Insurance Services at (877) 860-7378 or, email us @ ProPest@Leavitt.com.

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For an additional charge, you may access a 24-hour hotline providing consultation by qualified medical doctors on pesticide-related medical emergencies. This service is provided free of charge to Peacock Group insureds.