Ed Robinson founded PRYSM Marketing in 1989 to serve the needs of principals and customers in the fenestration industry.

A close look at MANA’s membership rolls uncovers a number of independent representative firms working outside the sphere of the typical MANA member. One such firm is PRYSM Marketing, Inc. Focused strictly on the fenestration industry, PRYSM markets and sells component parts and related products to manufacturers of windows, doors and insulated glass in the Eastern portion of the United States.

Established in 1989, the agency offers highly trained sales professionals with years of experience in the window and glass industries. The corporate headquarters in Doylestown supports regional salespeople by providing customer service and account follow-up.

The agency was started by Ed Robinson and a since-retired partner nine years before joining MANA in 1998. According to Robinson, “As a sales manager on the OEM side of the supplier chain, I saw various models of successful sales agencies. When we made the decision to start a sales and marketing firm in 1989, we tried to mimic the most successful aspects of those agencies and develop a hybrid agency — one that truly assisted in marketing and sold on a technical vs. a price basis.”

Promoting a New Agency

When the agency opened its doors more than 25 years ago, it was done with a bit of a different approach to introducing itself. “We used what I’d call a clever introduction of our agency to the OEM market we targeted,” explains Robinson. “We sent each prospective principal a crisp one dollar bill attached to a letter stating that this was the first dollar they made with PRYSM Marketing, and would they like to make more? In my opinion it was simple and cheeky, but we still get comments on it years later. With that as a beginning, PRYSM Marketing has expanded from a more regional sales agency to now covering close to 30 states with regional sales professionals.”

Spencer Wilkinson (left), managing partner, conducts a product demonstration during the agency’s marketing meeting.

Growing to the point where it now covers more than half the country hasn’t been without its challenges. Robinson explains that perhaps the greatest challenge the agency and its employees have faced and met has been “Communication! As your agency expands you find that your various principals all expect sales updates, assistance in budgeting and follow-up. The greatest problem we struggle with is trying to find a generic method to provide the supplier with this information. Sometimes, it becomes an impossible task. We have suppliers that work off SAP and other global software technologies that have formats for information flow. We have to work with each supplier to customize information. Everyone can see the benefit of good information, but it does conflict with time in front of the customer selling.”

Acknowledging the fact that PRYSM serves a market different from the MANA norm, Robinson notes that “We’re predominantly in the window, door, insulated glass and curtain-wall business. The biggest influence in our industry has been the development of automated equipment. This has allowed lead times to shrink dramatically and that has had an effect on the supply chain side. As a result, we spend a lot of time pushing orders through our suppliers and monitoring their delivery. We also try to educate our customers on lead times and the importance of planning ahead. This has added a level of customer service to our business that we have had to support with internal sales support personnel that act as a link between our customers and suppliers.”

The PRYSM Marketing team is seen here in the midst of its marketing meeting earlier this year.

Constant Challenges

Changes in the industry that PRYSM serves aren’t the only concerns Robinson has. Just as the majority of agents serving other industries, the status of the economy is something he’s got to pay attention to. “We witnessed the growth years of the early 2000s. We also witnessed the devastating loss of business and loss of customers. Our customer list shrank by close to 40 percent during the recession. It’s only within the last 18 months that we have seen a resurgence that seems like it might stay around for a while.”

The economy isn’t the only common thread PRYSM shares with its fellow MANA members:

• Contracts and retainers — “We try to not work without contracts and for the most part have been successful at doing that. We have actually worked for certain suppliers more than once in 25 years. Management and needs change and they revisit using our services; we have had several successful examples of this. As for retainers, we are no longer in a position to do missionary work. If a supplier has no transferable commissions and is expecting us to spend our dollars to introduce them into our industry at our expense, it’s not a true partnership. We have requested and received retainers. They usually have a reasonable time limit attached to them and eventually our commission exceeds the stipend. It’s been a mostly successful scenario for both parties.”
• Termination — “Termination issues are tricky. I have a general philosophy that it’s much better to part friends then enemies. You never know when a key person will show up later in your business career. If you have a solid contract in place, you have a road map to separate if that becomes the outcome. After all, it’s business — nothing is a guarantee.”
• Technology/Social media — “We have found LinkedIn to be the best format for social media. It keeps us in touch with our industry and keeps us networked. We believe we were the first rep firm to offer a website in our industry (www.Prysm-Marketing.com). We have had to keep up with the times and have utilized technical support and updated web presence outside our company. We have also had an ongoing successful drawing for prizes called ‘Windough,’ which gives our customers another reason to visit our website.”
• Finding qualified personnel — “So far we have been lucky by networking amongst our industry friends to fill open positions. We have not had a tremendous amount of turnover within our staff. We offer health care insurance and 401K plans as a benefit to our employees. When you are a small company as we are, we try not to have employee turnover. Many of our employees have been on staff for more than 10 years.”

Saul Santiago (left) and Ron Robinson, managing partners, examine one of their principals’ products.

If Robinson and PRYSM are busy meeting today’s business challenges, that doesn’t mean he doesn’t keep an eye on the future. As he looks out over the business landscape for the next 10-15 years, he notes, “Eventually technology will change what we do. We are still very dependent on face-to-face sales calls and visits today. But as the customer management teams get younger, they are comfortable with teleconferencing via SKYPE and we will have to adapt accordingly. We can envision a time when product features and applications will be routinely shown on video and orders can be asked for the same way. We still feel confident that personal relationships will be important and the manufacturers’ rep will continue to be the best option for OEM suppliers. Manufacturers’ reps have the time and incentive to focus on a market niche and we all have relationships with customers that are based on several products by numerous suppliers. A good rep firm is an addition to the customers’ purchasing and engineering departments.”

Why MANA?

As he looks to the future for himself and his agency, Robinson notes that MANA has been a contributor to PRYSM’s past and hoped-for future success: “We learned about MANA when we initially started PRYSM Marketing. We met with mentors and attended meetings in Phoenix where manufacturers’ reps and OEM suppliers had a joint conference. We have always relied upon MANA to learn about buy-sell agreements, contract negotiating, and other issues as they arise. It’s always been a comfort to bounce ideas off the MANA staff. They have been instrumental in our growth and the fact we just celebrated 25 years in business.”

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