“Opportunities are usually disguised as hard work, so most people don’t recognise them.” – Eppie Lederer.
The depth of talent at Meech extends far beyond our core team of engineers. Each month, we like to discuss how our team develops and distributes the solutions that enhance our customers’ manufacturing and industrial processes. Our robustly engineered technologies improve profitability, safety, productivity and quality through high-quality static management and web cleaning technologies. However, despite the machinery’s quality, you still need to get the product to the customers…
This month, meet Ian Atkinson – Sales Director.
“There is no time when there isn’t a salesperson in front of a customer.” That line encapsulates Ian’s world. As Sales Director, he supports Meech’s global sales offices and distributor network by coaching, unblocking and equipping sales colleagues who serve customers across both sectors and time zones. His role requires being both deft and detailed, understanding fast-moving internal production updates while ensuring expertise is on hand wherever a customer is based.
“My role as Sales Director is to support and steer all the salespeople, either those employed by Meech or those who work with our independent distributors.” Ian explains that Meech’s reach is “complex” because “we are a niche manufacturer of niche solutions, but the scope and applications of our products are very broad.” He adds: “Our sales teams are working constantly around the clock, because we cover all markets globally. In fact, our international exports were over 90% of our total last year.”
A big part of his day is spent overseeing the sales operations at Meech, “engaging with timely follow‑ups and contacting the sales offices, colleagues and distributors to find out what projects they’re working on and understand where they need support from us centrally.” That support often means “cross‑referencing other projects from one country to another and ensuring that the end customer is getting the absolute best solution.”
Ian is clear about his priorities: “We’re already known for our strengths in neutralising troublesome static charges, so we’re now looking at ways of sharing our other solutions.” For Ian’s team, this includes static generation, “to actually add static charges to materials to help processing, for example, static pinning or using charges in perforation detection.”
Keeping customers informed about Meech’s broad suite of solutions is another key focus for Ian and his team. “When our sales teams go in to solve our customers’ static problems, we already know that same static charge is also attracting airborne particles and contamination. We want to make sure that our team is asking customers about these other areas where we can solve problems, increase productivity and boost yields. That’s what we do!”
The broader Meech story reaches back further than a century and has seen countless changes to the product offering as technology and industry have developed. This constant process of adaptation and transformation shows no sign of slowing down and Ian’s detailed understanding of the technology behind Meech’s solutions keeps him alert to new opportunities. “We’re developing and extending our range of solutions into not just removing contamination from web materials but also cleaning a wide range of complex 3D components. For example, think of intricate car and motorcycle parts… before lacquer or paint is added, you must ensure that they’re immaculate.”
Working for Meech means Ian’s work isn’t just about hitting targets and generating revenue; it’s about genuinely enhancing the processes and output of manufacturers all over the world. “We recently helped a major RFID label printing customer to dramatically improve its product yields, in fact, by more than 50 per cent, which was game-changing for them. They couldn’t understand why they were getting such high failure rates… the answer? Static. We were able to deploy our new QAC product range to transform its manufacturing output. The payoff from implementing our solutions was very quick and it’s so rewarding to see.”
In line with the engineering approach behind the products Ian provides, adaptability and persistence are key to his sales philosophy. “The optimal solutions vary depending on each customer, the characteristics of the material and just how difficult the contaminant is to remove. We can’t always solve things straight away, but we love those challenges because it means we’re learning all the time.”
“We’ll always help them and we’ll always find a way.”
To learn more about the diverse applications of Meech’s solutions, visit: https://meech.com/applications/