54 DC VELOCITY SEPTEMBER 2014 www.dcvelocity.com
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company that provides safety labels and related products.
“People think they have their ducks in a row, but then are
surprised when the local inspectors show up and [tell them]
they are not compliant.”
Burgess notes that a wealth of material on fire, electrical,
and building safety, including hazard marking and signage,
can be found on the National Fire Protection Association’s
website ( www.nfpa.org). Most fire departments use NFPA
standardized codes as the basis for their own local codes,
but individual requirements may vary. For that reason, it’s
wise to check with your local fire department to see how
closely it follows NFPA guidelines and what
other codes may be in force.
SIGN LANGUAGE
As for what kinds of signs companies use,
Jeff Tanner, vice president of risk management at Kenco, a third-party logistics
company, says the signs posted in his company’s facilities fall into three basic categories: danger signs, caution signs, and safety
instruction signs.
Danger signs warn of conditions that can
cause serious harm or even death, such as
exposure to high-voltage electricity. Caution
signs warn against other possible threats,
such as a hot surface or a conveyor that
could start without warning. Safety instruction signs provide directions on where people should go in case of emergency or the
proper use of equipment.
“As an advocate of safety, we have to go
out and look for areas where we need to
develop signs to assure safety,” says Tanner.
“For instance, we might place a sign near our dock doors
that states, ‘Jumping from dock doors is prohibited, use the
pedestrian door.’”
Other signs might identify areas in which propane fuel is
in use, “no smoking” areas, low clearances, or zones where
lift trucks are prohibited from entering.
Agee reports that signs play a major role in assuring
safety at the International Paper plant. “Every door you go
through tells if forklift traffic is on the other side,” he says.
“Being in ‘tornado alley,’ there are also signs to direct peo-
ple to storm shelters.”
As for the signage itself, today’s signs (which can be
bought ready-made from suppliers or created in-house)
are just as likely to feature symbols as the traditional text.
In fact, symbol signs are growing in use and are required
in some instances. Research confirms that people respond
faster to graphics, known as pictograms, than to text.
“Pictograms improve sign recognition from a distance,
well before text is legible,” says Jack Rubinger of Graphic
Products, a supplier of industrial label printers for safety,
productivity, and compliance programs.
We’ve all seen these symbol-laden signs before: A picture
of a person walking with a line drawn through it means
“Don’t walk here.” A pictogram of safety glasses in a battery
changing room reminds workers to wear eye protection.
A symbol of a horn blowing warns lift truck drivers to hit
their horn when approaching a blind corner.
Good signage and labeling are especially important for
facilities that experience high turnover, rely heavily on
temp workers, or have a lot of visitors. And at warehouses
where English is not the first language for a majority of
workers, pictograms are essential.
While the primary purpose of signs in
facilities is to promote safe practices, good
signage can also yield other benefits.
“The [main] reason to use signs is to
promote safety, but they can also [improve]
workflow,” says Barry Alves, label systems
consultant at Peak-Ryzex, a systems integration company that also provides labeling solutions. He says that while good
signage saves on lost employee workdays,
the return on investment from productivity increases alone can be as short as six to
eight months.
“The signs can tell people where to be,
where not to be, and how to go. It gives
them a workflow pattern and process that
they can follow,” Alves says.
Another way to accomplish that is
through floor markings. Some operations
mark travel lanes for facility vehicles (and
include stop-sign warnings at major intersections to reduce the chance of accidents),
Among the companies that use floor markings to denote
pedestrian lanes is Kenco. “We train our people to stay in
the lanes [wherever possible], as the lift truck drivers look
for you to be there,” says Tanner. He adds that some sites
mark the pedestrian lanes with large footprints to further
indicate where people should walk.
STICK WITH IT
In addition to proper signage, many regulations require
specific labeling. Again, OSHA, NFPA, and your local
fire department can provide details on what’s required. If
your facility uses or distributes hazardous chemicals (and
just about all do, as the definition is broadly interpreted),
you’re required to mark them according to the Globally
Harmonized System (GHS), a worldwide standard for the
classification and marking of chemicals.
“GHS requires distributors to label containers that they
are shipping,” says Labelmaster’s Burgess. “For instance, a
case of paint may contain six cans,” he says. “The paint cans
