Caring is the core of safety 

The most dreaded call a leader in the manufacturing space can receive is that one of his or her employees has been injured — or, worse yet, killed — on the job. Every injury, in some way, is a failure on the part of leadership. And helping people get home safely requires a leadership component that is seldom talked about: Genuinely caring about others. Just as employees look forward to getting back home to their loved ones, they must also be led by a leader and work on a team that cares about their well-being. This understanding then drives each individual to act in ways that protect their own and others’ health and safety on the job. 

Caring and safety impact desirable business outcomes 

As the CEO at Vibrantz, I remind our employees often that if we are not world class in safety then we can never be our best as a company nor achieve our vision of becoming a world-class company. An organization led by managers who truly care and a workplace that takes safety seriously can positively impact key business outcomes. Gallup’s 2023 State of the Global Workplace Report shows employees who feel like someone cares for them are more likely to show care and respect for others, creating a safer work environment for the team. This is then a strong predictor of employee retention, safety, productivity and financial performance. Gallup’s 2020 meta-analysis of its Q12 inventory shows that corporate cultures in the top quartile of their database have 64% fewer incidents versus those with lower scores. 

Media coverage of refinery operation explosions over the last some decades demonstrates the connection between caring and safety. Often cited as a key contributor to these sad and disastrous occurrences are poor safety cultures that ignore warning signs, allow or enable deficient safety management programs and/or accept the use of obsolete equipment. This “check the boxes” sort of mentality is the opposite of the care managers and leaders must demonstrate daily. And sadly, they ended in employee deaths and cost companies billions. 

Strong safety systems are key  

There is no “easy button” to push or single path to follow for a company to become world-class in safety. But leaders can impact safety performance with systems that make it hard for anyone to get hurt. 

Safety systems can be implemented immediately to drive near-term improvement and include basics like the proper personal protective equipment required to do specific jobs, properly maintained capital equipment and tools, and agreed-upon safety rules the entire organization follows. Additionally, a focus on leading indicators like safety scorecards and spot audits by environmental health and safety leaders are powerful tools to help the organization identify and report potential hazards before they become an actual incident. This is where policy implementation can also play a key role. For example, when Vibrantz’s safety performance showed a majority of incidents over a period involved hand cuts and injuries, we implemented a cutting devices policy that helped us eliminate hand injuries caused by open blades for the remainder of the year. Throughout 2023, we invested over $3.7 million in 3,400 projects to improve machine guarding to make it that much harder for any employee to get injured. 

The power of employee observations in daily work can also not be understated. We rely on employees to constantly be aware of work surroundings and notify managers of where improvements can be made. At Vibrantz, we regularly share the positive impacts of employee observations in improving safety. One employee noticed condensation droplets falling from a cold-water pipe, creating a slip hazard, and informed management so the pipes could be insulated. Another employee worked with a supplier to adjust how high they were stacking pallets so unloading was less risky for people. We also saw employees going up and down a main, wide staircase without holding one of the left or right handrails, so a center rail was installed to encourage its use. All of these seem small…until they result in injury. 

Safety culture cannot be understated 

Building a safety mindset from the inside out is long-game work but equally as important as systems. Ultimately, leaders must weave safety into the organization’s fabric such that it is a core value — in word and deed — and exhibited in a way such that employees speak up when they see something perceived as unsafe. This is where emotional safety becomes critical. Take the employee who may notice a friend at work who appears sleepy driving a forklift but chooses not to say anything to that friend or her supervisor. Often, this unwillingness to speak up is driven by an environment that has caused a perception that people will be punished or penalized if they say something. 

Culture is also heavily impacted by seemingly simple actions like leaders making safety the first item on every morning’s agenda, walking around the shop floor each day to speak to employees and observe processes, and framing “speaking up” as the truest form of demonstrating care for one another. At Vibrantz, our employees often hear us say they have not only the right, but the responsibility, to stop work if they see something unsafe. We continue to communicate that nothing employees do each day is worth them getting hurt. Vibrantz launched a safety challenge in May and June 2024, wherein over 95% of sites had zero recordables in May, and we are working toward 100% in June.  

Safety really can work from the inside out 

One of the most unexpected and memorable interactions I had in 2023 occurred shortly after Vibrantz implemented our cutting devices policy. While visiting one of our manufacturing sites, an employee shared that she had also encouraged her family to remove any unnecessary open blades at home where it made sense and gave opening packages in the mail as one example. That conversation is the epitome of what can happen when an organization commits to improving and leading safety through systems and culture in ways that also drive engagement, business results and accountability. The more our leaders care, the safer our companies can become, and the more parents, siblings and spouses get home to those who need them most. 

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Since Vibrantz began our journey in 2022, we have prioritized process optimization, the enhancement of safety measures and the consolidation of our technology landscape to align with our long-term goals. We take pride in our ability to be agile over our first two years as a company as we have integrated and built the foundation for a strong continuous improvement mindset in all we do.

To date, our integration efforts have yielded significant cost synergies, showcasing our commitment to efficiency and excellence as we continue to integrate and optimize as one company. Despite industrial market challenges, we strategically standardized operations and drove productivity improvements to navigate economic headwinds and position ourselves for growth. Among many actions in 2023, we:

• Created a business intelligence program to overcome our fragmented systems
• Opened an online training platform powered by Vector Solutions
• Consolidated the Vibrantz banking structure
• Began consolidating our enterprise resource planning (ERP) into a single SAP S/4HANA instance

Our journey toward operational excellence is an ongoing endeavor, and while we have a long way to go still, this is the only way to create and sustain our competitive position in the market. In this issue of Vibrantz Edge, we invite you to explore key initiatives that have made us a more efficient company and dive deeper into a few products that enhance our daily lives.

Safety is at the heart of our organization

Ensuring the safety of our people is paramount and we strive to be an injury-free workplace. Our safety program begins with robust systems that identify risks, develop and implement corrective actions and share practices to minimize risks across the organization. We are educating, training and listening to our employees to ensure Vibrantz is continuously thinking, caring and working safely.

We rolled out our online environmental health and safety (EHS) management system, Vector Solutions, at the end of 2022, which offers real-time information related to incidents in a uniform and trackable way. This allows our EHS and management teams to better understand what is happening at each location, determine root causes and create action plans to address any issues. In parallel, we also launched a learning management system, Vibrantz Online University (VOU), that allows for the same training to be delivered across the globe in local languages and provides a breadth of courses including EHS, compliance, computer skills, harassment, diversity and inclusion, and countless others.

“It has been a pleasure working with our sites’ EHS and HR management teams to integrate Vector systems into our daily functions and to support them as we work toward our goal of zero injuries. In the future, we will utilize Vector EHS data and Power BI dashboards to report safety metrics in real-time. We are also developing specific training packages focused on talent development, safety and compliance, and new employee onboarding.”

– Marie Cox, EHS Master Analyst

Bridging the gap between data and decision making

Harnessing the power of data is key to making timely and informed decisions. We have built a data foundation using Power BI, which has been instrumental in providing us with a comprehensive view of our business. With Power BI, our commercial and finance team can generate global reports on sales, monitor key performance indicators, and identify trends with precision. This has not only expedited financial reporting processes but has also facilitated proactive decision-making, allowing us to optimize budgets, forecast more accurately and allocate resources efficiently.

“Power BI’s impact goes beyond visuals and filters. It automates data processing, saving time for value-added tasks. The real magic happens when disparate datasets from multiple ERP systems seamlessly align, thanks to the relentless efforts of our IT team. This allows our finance team to ensure accuracy and reliability, underscoring cross-functional teamwork in efficiency and innovation.”

– Nick Lovick, Vice President of Operational Finance, Color Solutions

Driving financial excellence through treasury consolidation

Efficient treasury management is essential for optimizing cash flow, managing risk and maximizing returns. When Vibrantz was established, each legacy company had its own U.S. domestic cash management bank, resulting in inefficient way to manage funds among several bank accounts.

In recent months, our treasury consolidation team efforts designed a centralized domestic cash management system, automated routine transactions and encouraged the use of advanced analytics, to give Vibrantz better control and transparency over our financial operations. This work strengthens relationships with our financial partners, improves liquidity management and facilitates strategic decision-making. Ultimately, these efficiencies will enable our agility in a dynamic market environment and better position us for sustainable growth.

“I am proud to be part of this transformational process, as it embodies our commitment to continuously improve and strengthen our financial resilience. Vibrantz will now experience better payment processing, reporting and overall administration.”

– Antonio Pugas, Vice President and Treasurer

Integrating our company through harmonized processes

To overcome challenges operating with multiple ERPs, we began consolidating into a single SAP S/4HANA instance. By retiring our outdated platforms, we can adopt standardize processes and focus on areas where we can innovate to drive growth. This multi-year project is a significant investment in our future and will allow us to keep building a world-class company in which we take great pride. 

As we continue to evolve and adapt to changing landscapes, these operational efficiencies remain integral to our growth strategy, enabling us to navigate challenges, capitalize on opportunities and deliver value to all stakeholders. By embracing a culture of continuous improvement and leveraging technology and best practices, we are confident in our ability to achieve even greater success in the years to come.

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As Randy Pausch, renowned for his wisdom in The Last Lecture, once expressed, “When we’re connected to others, we become better people.” In other words, when people realize their unique contribution to furthering a goal, then true ownership emerges. At the core of our corporate social responsibility (CSR) – or sustainability and environmental, social and governance (ESG) – efforts is a powerful shared belief that we are the best versions of ourselves when we are connected to and positively impacting others. We recognize the synergistic effects of dedicating a balanced focus to our stakeholders. We hold one another accountable for making decisions and fulfilling commitments in ways that consider more than financial gain.  

Vibrantz’s CSR Council is a powerful example of this data in real life.  

Our CSR journey 

As we began to lay the foundation for our CSR program, the Vibrantz team was fueled by the powerful shared belief that we are the best versions of ourselves when we are positively impacting others. Personally, leaving people and projects better than I found them is a big “why” for me. The chance to guide Vibrantz’s impact on the world through the establishment of our CSR Council has felt like an extension of this “Why” and been something I’ve looked forward to each day. 

Much like me, our Council subcommittee leads raised their hands asking to help champion some facet of our CSR program, whether it be environmental, health and safety, stakeholder impact, sustainable procurement, or product management. In 2024, the team’s incredible efforts over the short span of roughly a year and a half together will culminate in Vibrantz’s first CSR Report.  

“Vibrantz has empowered us to foster a positive impact on investors, employees, the environment and society at large. Through collaborative teamwork and our diverse experiences, responsibilities and regions, we are shaping the future of our company in an exceptional way.” 

–Antonio Piñeiro, Quality, Environment, Health, Safety and Sustainability, EMEA 

As expected, the report will include an overview of our CSR journey, improvements and impacts across our sustainability focus areas. But the often hard-to-quantify and difficult-to-achieve driving force behind the body of work is our Council members’ personal connections to Vibrantz’s purpose and the importance of sustainability in our everyday lives.  

“My role on the Council involves collecting global environment and energy data, which has given me the opportunity to engage with colleagues across diverse business units, facilities and regions and exchange insights on sustainability initiatives. Their inputs are invaluable in helping to advance our aspirational CSR program.” 

–Qian Shen, Director Environment, Health and Safety, APAC 

Our commitment to CSR is just one of the ways Vibrantz is dedicated to shaping a future as an enduring world-class specialty chemicals and materials solutions provider. Along this journey, we continue to listen, learn and value diverse perspectives from a global team who is increasingly proud to share their unique contributions and be part of the shared Vibrantz experience as we work to make life more vibrant.   

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Data shows that happy employees are 20% more productive and engaged employees are four times more likely to feel extremely proud of the products and services their organization offers. At Vibrantz, our commitment to each other fuels how we work together toward our purpose, celebrate successes, solve difficult challenges, develop professionally and grow personally. By promoting engagement and supporting well-being, we are cultivating an environment where we actively seek, take to heart and honor employee opinions and perspectives.

Empowering Vibrantz employees

At Vibrantz, we believe that our success is intrinsically linked to the people who work here. We believe we are the best versions of ourselves when we are positively impacting others and it is why we actively prioritize initiatives that foster a happy, healthy and engaged workforce. Throughout 2023, we have progressed various commitments in support of employee engagement and well-being including:

Launched our first Manager Engagement Training (MET) program at sites worldwide. We all need basic tools and resources to do our jobs effectively and it is even more important than managers have the training and competencies to lead their teams with confidence and ease. Vibrantz created and launched MET as a way to ensure supervisors and managers have knowledge in the areas of safety, people, financial, operational and strategic leadership to ensure our employees worldwide have world-class managers and supervisors.

The training highlighted how much influence leaders can have on an organization’s safety and provided simple and effective tools we can implement at the various Vibrantz sites. I had the opportunity to connect with other Vibrantz leaders, and their insights and experiences were incredibly beneficial.

-Jordan Patric, Multisite plant manager

Launched Safestart training at many of our manufacturing sites. With safety as one of our six core values, we are focused on ensuring our employees get home to their families alive and well at the end of each day. Safestart is a well-known behavioral-based safety program we are leveraging as we build a strong culture focused on safety.

Established employee involvement committees (EICs) – At 60 sites worldwide, these committees create and promote employee participation that fosters connections with each other, our values and communities. To date, 90% of our sites have an active EIC in place and are organizing and hosting one event per month to promote local team building, employee appreciation, company values, and a positive presence in our communities.

“As an EIC member for Norcross, Georgia, I’ve seen firsthand how the monthly activities have enhanced site morale, leaving employees feeling appreciated and grateful to make a difference within our local community.”

–Valerie Gamble, Supply chain supervisor, Color Solutions, North America

Celebrated our second annual virtual 5K – Nearly 2,000 employees across the world came together to participate in physical activities such as running, walking, biking, swimming, hiking and everything in between for a virtual five-kilometer “race.”

“The virtual 5K was a fun and inspiring way to connect with our Thailand team and other colleagues around the world through movement. It showcased how well we can work together, even when physically distant.”

– Nok Woravuvichayavong, Country Manager, Thailand

Debuted Vibrantz in Action (VIA) – Earlier this year, we launched VIA, our philanthropy program committed to engaging our employees and improving the communities we serve. VIA hosts four quarterly events each year focused in the areas of environmental stewardship, well-being, and science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) education. Our first VIA event was held in late August as part of our second virtual 5K event. Many of our teams around the world participated in our 5K event in some physical activity and also hosted a team event together focused on promoting their community’s well-being.

“VIA was created from our powerful shared belief that we are the best versions of ourselves when we are actively connected to and positively impacting others. While the VIA committee has created the foundation and overall structure of the philanthropy program, already we are watching our teams at sites around the world personalize what ‘action’ in their communities looks like to them. It’s inspiring, encouraging and we have only just begun.”

-Caitlin Ramsey, Senior Manager, Marketing Communications

The enthusiastic participation and camaraderie around these recent programs underscore how our people are choosing to connect and bridge the distance that separates us. By prioritizing employee engagement and well-being, Vibrantz strives to create a positive and sustainable culture that attracts top talent and ensures long-term prosperity. With a philosophy rooted in people being at the center of all we do, Vibrantz sees investing in our employees is an investment in our long-term future.

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We talk regularly as a team about the importance of controlling what we can. During a recent employee town hall, we highlighted inspiring examples of how we are keeping our six core values in focus and advancing in impactful ways related to environmental health and safety, our employees, continuous improvement, corporate social responsibility and customer excellence. Despite market challenges, we have improved our safety performance, begun implementing employee involvement committees at sites worldwide to promote our culture, forged ahead with our integration activities, finalized our near-term growth strategy, and continued investing in innovative technologies and projects.

I am often asked what I’m most excited about related to our company’s future. Without hesitation, two words come to mind; words we’ve used often since our legacy organizations became Vibrantz: Better together. As one company, Vibrantz now has core competencies in particle engineering, material science and color technology, and we’ve used our expertise platform powerfully over the last year plus to positively impact customers all over the world.  

This month, the blog features inspiring examples across our three business units of how coming together has amplified our ability to embrace our core commitment to customer excellence.

Perhaps one of the more obvious ways Vibrantz is now able to benefit customers is through our expanded advanced materials, color solutions and performance coatings offerings. Our July 2023 blog featuring Vibrantz’s play in automotive is a perfect example. Automotive equipment manufacturers who may have previously only used our automotive polishing for exteriors, now have access to our advanced technologies for batteries, our metallic and protective pigments and colorants, and more.

Being the larger company we are today and having a broader global reach doesn’t mean we’ve lost sight of what we do best, which is being uniquely positioned to help customers solve their toughest challenges. Day in and day out, I watch our talented, creative and incredibly dedicated employees partner with customers to ensure they get unique, high-performing solutions tailored to their exacting specifications. Take, for example, our custom engobes and glazes for bricks. As builders and homeowners desire an increasing variety of color and performance options in home materials, our customers must keep pace. And for the last 100 years, Vibrantz has been alongside our customers manufacturing products that improve the quality, vividness and color retention of bricks.

If you’re a customer, you likely interact with a Vibrantz team member and understand their impact on our ability to serve you. We thank you for your partnership and the continued opportunity to serve you. If you’re a Vibrantz employee, I am grateful for you. Our 5,000 colleagues around the world are why we are better for each other and customers. Your expertise, agility and optimism are the momentum helping us find certainty in today’s world. Here’s to moving the ball downfield…together.

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We haven’t plugged our destination coordinates into a mapping app or given the address to a ride share driver as we sit idly waiting to get to the other side. On the contrary, the Vibrantz experience just over one year in is an exciting road trip where – day in and day out – our leaders and 5,000 employees are hyper focused on the steps required to keep serving our 11,000 customers while integrating, innovating and navigating today’s dynamic economic landscape. 

It’s fitting, then, that this month our blog stories focus on Vibrantz’s impact in automotive applications. In other words, we’re featuring just a few of the ways that our journey is positively impacting yours.

Weekly, the media is awash with stories featuring transportation trends. Regardless of the extent and rate at which cars and trucks are electrified, automated or used as a service, getting from point A to B in a private vehicle is something the world is rather attached to. According to Statista, private vehicle travel today is preferred by almost two times that of public transport.

It’s easy to assume the role of a chemicals and materials company in the automotive space is solely in the raw input materials used to make vehicle batteries. But for decades, Vibrantz’s advanced materials, color solutions and performance coatings have played a leading role in making vehicles safer, stand-out, more efficient and – also critical – that support the global shift to produce greener cars and trucks. Whether it’s our abrasives for brake pads, frits and glazes for taillight sensors, tanning agents, colorants and pigments for vehicle interiors, or glass enamels for windshields – Vibrantz scientists obsess over daily commute details so drivers don’t have to.

But that’s not even the best part. Our manufacturing employees also take great pride in being an important part of the vehicles driving on roads worldwide. When asked about his work at our Villagran, Mexico, facility, Guadalupe Garcia, an R&D pigments chemist said:

“I love working on products like our reflective pigments that enable cooler surfaces on cars. We really are working on solving the biggest challenges and demands of today’s market.”

Cuauhtemoc Rosas, the glass plant manager in Villagran, also shared:

“The Vibrantz purpose, vision and values – particularly safety – guide our behavior and are manifested in the products we make. Like the automotive pastes that enable windshield safety. It’s awesome seeing how our efforts are part the bigger team bringing these solutions to life.”

And while we’re proud of our impact on vehicles to date, our sights are also set further down the highway as the landscape evolves to include more hybrid and electric vehicles (EVs). We recently announced the construction of a pilot project that will process high-purity manganese sulfate (HPMSM) used in batteries as original equipment manufacturers prioritize the production of zero-emission vehicles. Over the next three years, this expansion is anticipated to increase our HPMSM capacity to a level that could help power two million EVs as we provide an additional manganese sulfate alternative for the battery market serving EVs.

If you’re not yet following us on LinkedIn or X, formerly known as Twitter, I invite you to do so. If you’d like to learn about the fascinating science helping elevate everyday products, subscribe to our Vibrantz Edge blog.

If nothing else, enjoy a little “Go Your Own Way” by Fleetwood Mac as you commute and journey through this month’s stories with us. 

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The challenge of bringing together three companies and three different cultures is something we continue to take seriously.  A recent McKinsey report stated that 25% of executives cite cultural misalignment as an integration concern. So how are we building a strong, shared culture that helps ensure Vibrantz thrives?

Our people are our why

Our 5,000+ employees are our greatest strength. They are the why behind so much of what we do, like why we focus so strongly on developing, rewarding and retaining our employees and why we work together to ensure we’re bringing our core purpose to life each day. 

We’re uniquely passionate about creating a highly engaged workforce. This means we are committed to creating a workplace where our people come to work each day and can perform tasks that suit their skills and talents, but also that they can do work that challenges, inspires and brings them pride. If we can do this, we will succeed far beyond providing strong financial results.”

– Imelda Torres-Laborde, Executive Vice President and Chief Human Resources Officer

Programs built to leave a legacy

As we work toward our vision to become an enduring and sustainable organization, we envision a Vibrantz with our six core values – safety, commitment to customers, our people, sustainability and the environment, commitment to excellence and integrity, ethics and trust, – as part of the organization’s fabric. We have worked hard in our first year to begin building a collaborative environment and our sites have gone above and beyond in the commitment they’ve shown. In the past year our team has:

• Celebrated International Women’s Day with employees worldwide and focused on inclusion 
• Hosted a virtual 5K event for employees, neighbors and families to connect while being active
• Heard from over 90% of employees in our first employee feedback survey
• Continued to hear from over 200 employees directly via in-person focus groups worldwide
• Commemorated our one-year anniversary as Vibrantz
• Been recognized as the fifth most active chemical company on social media in the U.S. and 29th in the world

We aim to have our people feel valued, and we are in the business of improving their lives at work and in their communities. We have begun to measure and strengthen our workforce’s engagement and the investments we’re making to ensure employees’ safety, development and inclusion. Additionally, we are focusing on our sustainability efforts with a mission to ensure the vibrancy of our people, culture, communities and planet.  As part of these efforts, we have an employee-led council in place to help drive what it means for Vibrantz to be connected with our employee base by defining what it means to: 

• Be involved
• Have a voice and feel valued
• Belong to an organization that is diverse and inclusive
• Be a company that is sought after because we are an employer-of-choice

We expect to launch our first sustainability report in 2024, highlighting the work of our Corporate Social Responsibility Council whose efforts are rooted in the powerful shared belief that we are the best versions of ourselves when we are positively impacting others. 

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We reorganized our new company into three rational business units with new leadership and ways of working collaboratively. We also began to develop a strong, shared culture as we rally around our purpose to bring color, performance and vibrancy to life and our six core values.

We are proud of who we are and what we do.

We’re experts and innovators focused on solving challenges, embracing change and growing. We are innovators passionate about helping you and committed to creating a workplace where employees authentically contribute their best. Our purpose to bring color, performance and vibrancy to life is evident every day in the work we do to provide critical, high-value products; in the creative, innovative and team-oriented spirit embodied by our employees; and in our pledge to be a responsible, thoughtful and impactful presence in our communities.

We elevate the everyday.

Our advanced materials, color solutions and performance coatings are used in small amounts to make sizable impacts on a variety of industrial and consumer applications.

We have made great strides in Year One as Vibrantz.

Since Day One, we have worked to become a sustainable, world-class specialty chemicals and materials provider. In our first year together, we made incredible strides:

• Shared processes and drove efficiencies
• Exhibited, attended or presented at more than 35 industry trade shows
• Launched a new corporate website to demonstrate our broader Vibrantz offering
• Rolled out our global Environmental Health and Safety strategy
• Finalized plans to launch a new corporate philanthropy program
• Regularly communicated externally via social media and our CEO podcast series

A look ahead at what you can expect.

We are committed to continuing to provide world-class service and products. Expect us to:

• Focus on maintaining and working to continually improve service levels
• Continue investing in safety, maintenance and optimization projects at our sites
• Identify the most promising innovation pipeline projects and work to advance them faster
• Share more about our sustainability initiative, including lifecycle impacts of some products  
• Gather feedback from customers in a survey later this year to understand how we can improve

Thank you for choosing to partner with us.

We hope you experience the Vibrantz brand as reflective of who we are – energetic and bold – and what we do best, which is innovating to bring color, performance and vibrancy to life. We are excited to share our journey as Vibrantz in each edition of our monthly blog.

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