One Place for Product Training & More:
A Bartle & Gibson Case Study

Problem

Bartle & Gibson needed a learning management solution that could give them access to supplier product knowledge training, in addition to managing their compliance, safety, and professional development training in one place.

Solution

Bartle & Gibson started working with BlueVolt, allowing them to access supplier training through the BlueVolt network and to centralize training for both users and managers.

The Story

Bartle & Gibson, a wholesaler for plumbing, heating, and electrical products, has been around for over 80 years. Located in Canada, they carry over 2000 brands across 31 distribution branches.

According to Julia Ritchie, the HR Coordinator for Bartle & Gibson, they’ve been with BlueVolt since 2019. They use it to manage training for about 680 employees across Bartle & Gibson and its sister company, Best Plumbing and Lighting.

While they had used other Learning Management Systems to handle internal training before, Ritchie explained they shifted to BlueVolt because BlueVolt is a preferred partner of AD (Affiliated Distributors) and offered specific product training not offered elsewhere.

Product Training

One of the key benefits of BlueVolt for Bartle & Gibson is access to BlueVolt’s network of supplier product training.

“Especially as we’re launching new partnerships with suppliers, [our BlueVolt account manager has] been really good at keeping an eye on that and helping coordinate with the suppliers to get that training,” Ritchie said.

Bartle & Gibson has also recently broken into a new vertical, and product training has been crucial for their employees.

“We launched HVAC into our company on our wholesale side a year and a half ago now, and so that’s been a lot of product knowledge training,” Ritchie said. “Getting those partners has been helping us keep our staff up to date.”

Compliance & Professional Development Training

In addition to product training, Bartle & Gibson manages safety, compliance, professional development, and leadership training through BlueVolt.

For safety and compliance, Ritchie appreciates how easy it is to bring in outside courses or to access the BlueVolt Course Library for courses to fit needs as they arise.

“It’s seamless for me to upload courses. That process is very painless,” Ritchie said.

Furthermore, Ritchie uses specific Training Tracks™ to manage personal development training in areas such as customer service, safety, account management, and more, as well as their leadership development program, which is offered to both potential future leaders and those who have recently taken on management responsibilities.

“It is a major component for us to have appropriate Training Tracks and monitor that progress,” Ritchie said. “For our company and how big it is and how many managers we have, it has made a meaningful difference for us.”

One-Stop Shop

Overall, the biggest benefit Ritchie has found from using BlueVolt is having all of the company’s training in one place. With over 600 employees across a variety of roles, centralized training that is still unique to each learner’s use case is key.

“One huge thing is for our employees to have that one place to go to. They don’t like having multiple different logins,” Ritchie said. “Centralizing our suppliers, safety training materials, and policies in BlueVolt streamlines access and makes it significantly easier for them to find the resources they need.”

“It does make our completion rate a lot higher by having it all in one spot and not having to send them in circles to figure out different logins for everything.”

Ritchie added: “BlueVolt is very user-friendly. They don’t have issues navigating BlueVolt at all. In addition to it being a one-stop shop for all their training, they don’t have a hard time going in and figuring out how to launch courses.”

That ease of use is helpful on the administrative side as well, since administrators don’t have to spend time showing learners how to use the platform.

“Programs that are user-friendly for employees to navigate are a valuable benefit for us, because that also contributes to the success and the completion rate. They don’t get frustrated trying to find things and how to do it. So that has also been very helpful.”

Ritchie explained that the reporting is also helpful on the administrative side for compliance tracking: “it’s easy to pull reports to see who’s done their policies.”

For some courses, Ritchie added, “the employees are also getting notified when their certificates are expiring. So that helps us maintain our compliance.”

There are also useful notifications for administrators, from recently shared courses to Training Track reporting.

“The notifications make it much easier for me to manage everything behind the scenes,” Ritchie said. “There are reports for every course, which helps me stay organized.”

Conclusion

With product, safety, compliance, and professional development training all in one place, it’s easier than ever before for the HR team at Bartle & Gibson to keep their team up to date. Employees know where to find training, and the team can pull reporting at any time.

“BlueVolt serves as a one-stop shop for training, making administration more efficient and reducing the need for employees to manage multiple logins,” Ritchie said.

“There are so many benefits, honestly, to having BlueVolt.”

To learn more about how BlueVolt can help you streamline your training program, contact us today!