The Old-Fashioned Way

Written By:

Marc Blitstein / President & CEO

Posted On:

February 14, 2025

Today’s entrepreneurs can brainstorm a product concept, test it on social media, outsource production to China, utilize third-party warehousing and logistics through UPS, use cloud computing to process the order, offer payment processing through Amazon, and set up a customer service center in India. They never have to see or touch the product, the supplier, or the customer. They often employ just a handful of people, typically marketing and finance executives. The ONLY thing they touch is the cash. Many are, to borrow a phrase from the music industry, one-hit wonders.

It can be an effective way to move merchandise, but it’s NOT the way we do things. At ADC we like to do it the old-fashioned – some would say analog – way.

Our consumers purchase their ADC products from authorized ADC resellers. There are about 500 worldwide, and we know each and every one.

Perhaps the consumer learned of our products through our award-winning catalog or website – both developed by our in-house marketing/communication department. Or perhaps it was through one of our nearly 200 sales reps that detail them to the healthcare professional and institutions every day. Or through the nearly 5,000 sales professionals who work for those 500 resellers noted above.

Our resellers can order the product the consumer purchased electronically or, if they prefer, by fax, phone, or EDI. They will work with ADC’s in-house customer service team, all of whom take pride in processing that order and can answer any technical or logistical questions they may have.

Our shipping department picks, packs, and ships the order to that reseller for ultimate delivery to the consumer. Bar code scanning and video capture ensure we get it right, with less than 1 mistake per 10,000 customer order lines.

But before that can happen, our in-house purchasing department and logistics team, planning out as far 12 months, orders parts, packaging, and materials from our exclusive ISO certified manufacturing partners (including our own manufacturing subsidiary) throughout the world. We were an early adopter of a global supply chain solution to ensure we could produce the best products at prices that make sense.

ADC’s own warehousing team receives those shipments of components and stores them in our massive facility on Long Island, New York. Our quality control teams (located both offshore and in-house) inspect the components and products, both before vendor shipment and upon receipt in New York, to ensure they meet global and our more stringent ADC standards. Although we have dedicated quality staff, every single ADC employee – no matter their role – is empowered to raise questions or concerns.

Our production department then builds our finished products from these components: Adscope stethoscopes, Diagnostix sphymomanometers, otoscope and ophthalmoscope instrument sets, and Adview vital signs monitors, to name a few. We build nearly one million pieces a month. But before these end up on our ready-to-ship shelves, one more team, the FQC department, inspects the manufactured items to ensure they’re built both to spec and our standards of workmanship.

All of these efforts are supported with a mainframe computer that employs state-of-the-art manufacturing and distribution software (ERP) managed in house by our own IT staff.

Some would argue the outsourcing model leverages the expertise of those better equipped to handle those functions, allowing the entrepreneur to focus on what they do best. Maybe.

But I would counter that our traditional model ensures our customers get products built by a team of people deeply invested in the process from start to finish. That we care about the products we sell, the businesses that sell them, and the consumers that use them every day. That, my dear readers, is what mattered most to Neal and me, 41 years ago when we founded ADC. And that’s what continues to matter today.