Guilford Rail Provides
Customer Key Link From
Port to Production
Merrill Industries, Inc. and Merrill Marine Terminal Services, Inc. Provide services in the tradition established in 1929 by their founder, Paul E. Merrill.
Merrill's Marine Terminal is a growth oriented intermodal cargo transportation center, existing to profitably provide industrial customers with reliable, productive and responsive stevedoring, stockpiling, accumulation, distribution, warehousing and transfer services.
The Terminal unloaded its first cargo on January 27, 1982. Since that day, more than 3 million metric tons have been moved through the facility.
Merrill's Marine Terminal, located in the Port of Portland, ME has 4,000 feet of on-site rail sidings, is situated immediately adjacent to Route I-295 and is ten minutes from a commercial airport served by five major carriers.
To discuss the use of rail in Southern Maine and how it can affect local economic development, we sat down with the President and CEO (Photo on right) of Merrill Industries, Inc. and Merrill's Marine Terminal, Paul D. Merrill.
Q: What do you think Guilford Rail does best to serve its customers?
PD: Certainly what the railroad is designed to do and what it does best is to move large quantities of goods quickly and safely. That's where the railroad is a real winner, as well as providing consistentcy...being consistent is absolutely essential to the customer. They have to know that their product is going to move and that they can depend on it moving in a reasonable time frame...the investment we see the railroad making in electronics and sophisticated routing control is what gives us great optimism in the railroad's ability to deliver quality service
Q: Do you see expansion of rail use in the greater Portland area.
PD: This company looks forward to expanding its use of the railroad along with the Port of Portland. One reason is that the railroad is able to provide good consistent service to the Port of Portland. I hope that we will be ready to embrace change and by being flexible, will be better than competing ports. We do business in Portland that can't be done in Boston because we are more flexible in our outlook. We're able to do a better job for our customers in some cases than in Boston or Portsmouth. One element of that is our ability to work closely with the railroad to solve problems and provide quality customer service.
Q: What do you see are the advantages to using rail?
PD: The large volumes of cargo that can be shipped make it more economical. From a public policy standpoint, moving by rail is highly desirable in terms of air quality and traffic congestion. One of the keys to this terminal's success is that even though Merrill was historically a large trucking operation, the philosophy in establishing the terminal was not to feed the trucking industry but to offer better service to the customer and that way was to build it with rail in mind.
Q: As we walked in the building we passed a training session going on. Just how important is it for employees to keep up with training?
PD: We are in a very high risk business activity. We are constantly providing training programs for people to make sure that we do things as safely as possible. Concerning quality control, we're ISO-9000 certified. We have systems in place that assure that we're a consistently quality activity. In terms of boxcar loading we have participated in seminars sponsored by the railroad on loading techniques to ensure the safety of our employees and the quality level of the product.
Q: What is the biggest misconception about industrial development in Maine?
PD: Maine developed quite a reputation for being tough to do business in during the 1980's. Environmental concerns were always a problem. They're much more manageable now. While there has not been any significant loss in environmental concern, its handled in a much more manageable, pragmatic way than was the case in the 80's. There has also been a misperception about the resources that are available in Maine along with the flexibility of the employee base. I think the State should work towards quantifying the "Maine work ethic" and displaying it to potential developers.
Q: You have said that your father always envisioned this terminal, more so than you. What was his long-term vision?
PD: Well, he was a quintessential entrepreneur and he didn't spend a lot of time on plans. He relied on his experience and natural insights based on experience and his firm belief was that an independent, rather than a publicly-owned marine terminal facility was the most likely way that Portland could recover some element of cargo handling leadership.
As we look forward, I think future activity is going to continue to be firmly associated with the paper industry, which is Maine's primary natural resource, based on industrial activity. Like the railroad we're designed to service customers that have large volumes of commodities to handle. We are not a container operation so we don't focus on small quantities of high value goods. We are a bulk operation and that means that the vast amounts of pulp and paper that we handle by the paper industry is our stock and trade.
Q: What was the best lesson in business that your father taught you?
PD: There were many lessons and there continue to be lessons, because it's still possible to learn from decisions that were made in the past as you understand more. While it's not a business issue, it's an issue of life, integrity in doing business is the single most important item that breeds success. The basis for success is to develop something that people can rely on. Something you can count on is change. Nothing in business or economics is set...instead of being afraid of change we have to embrace it.
In 1996, more than 3700 boxcar loads of paper, pulp, coal and coke and other commodities were received or loaded at eight Merrill sidings. At Merrill, rail provides better and lower cost connections to everywhere.