When working in the wood shop today, I noticed we are having more members wearing respirators. This is a great thing as breathing wood dust is not good for you. This made me remember that @Robert_Davidson spoke at one of the recent board meeting about DMS purchasing respirators. Nice respirators are expensive I believe the one I use was $40.
Would it be a crazy idea to buy respirators in bulk and stock them in the galley, then ask Parks Pantry to add a item to the kiosk to purchase them, were DMS receives the funds minus credit card and processing fees?
I know parks has ways of kicking back revenue from the sales of items in the store. Maybe, if we take on the risk, they could build us a way to allow for safety items or even some of the single sale consumables around the space like sand paper to be sold through their kiosk so we don’t have to have a separate system?
I already purchased dust masks and they are beside the safety glasses in the workshop. I would ask that people use them sparingly as they are expensive.
I am personally not interested in another sales channel it’s pretty simple goto home depot and buy a respirator if you want one.
Here is another option they will even deliver it to you.
Also people should keep in mind these are PARTICULATE filters, not chemical filters. I see people wearing them when working with paints, cleaners, solvents, etc. Filters for chemicals/gases need to be specifically bought to filter out the specific chemical. The MSDS should help select the proper filter cartridges.
@Robert_Davidson are you saying that you want to block me from following up on this or just that you don’t think it is necessary?
I like that style of respirator you posted from amazon, those are great and very similar to the style I have. Plus, that price is good. If we had those for sale at DMS, I’m sure members would buy them. Especially when working in the wood shop.
I’m not a fan of the disposable paper/cloth style masks, I often find after using them the inside is covered with as much dust as the outside, meaning that a bunch of dust is sneaking in mainly through bad sealing around the edges. Better than nothing YES, better than the rubber 3M mask with removable filters no.
I’m not saying that you wasted time in selecting the masks you purchased, those are probably as good as you could get while holding to a budget that was acceptable for giving away in DMS. And, having free masks around so the members that would rather risk their health than spend money on a respirator is a noble step that I support.
Just would like the option to purchase great safety equipment within walking distance of the tools I would use it on.
I would hope I could work it through parks pantry. Not looking to make money on this, just to have access on site at DMS. No need to bring in committees until Parks is willing to let it work with their system. I don’t want to make a second kiosk when their’s is already there. Wouldn’t even mind if they had to be the ones selling it and making the profit.
Correct - they don’t have established channels for this and the odds are effectively zero that they’d add this to their lineup since it would involve an entirely new supplier for one customer.
Adding administrative burden is always risky, is the wood shop committee more likely to maintain respirators for sale or just try the more interesting invest in dust collection for whole room approach? When is next woodshop committee meeting? Would be a good topic to discuss there.
I’m partially guilty of this, but not with the N95 masks. The actual respirators we have around (typically a 3M 6000 series with some sort of cartridge other than the dust filters) I’ve often borrowed for finishing seems to protect from the readily-perceptible effects of the lacquer we used on the storage racks. Given that I couldn’t smell it nor did I get headaches nor other effects (like the last time when I didn’t use a respirator for the first few hours), it did indeed seem to be far better than nothing. The mechanism of action may well have been that of mechanically intercepting the overwhelming majority of larger-than-air laquer particles in the filter media as opposed to properly neutralizing or chemically capturing them.
Volunteer labor is a precious and unpredictable thing at DMS. Given the ready availability of reasonable-quality inexpensive respirators from Home Despot/the omnipresent 'Zon, and their relative durability, I’m not sure this is the best avenue to direct labor at.
maybe its just me, but respirators dont seem like the kind of thing people should share. I keep my own in my box, I feel like DMS just stocking the disposable ones would be the better route and if you want better you bring your own.
Another fun fact about respirators, the cartridges have a small use life for chemicals. I was reading about this in a forum on clear coating where they put most cartridges at around 40 hours of use before you should replace them, and that you should seal them tightly in a bag between uses for you may be losing some of that work time while storing the mask. It is an annoying challenge protecting your lungs from all the harms out there. If we just didn’t live so long to suffer all the side effects of not protecting our lungs.
I 100% agree with this. I’m slightly more willing to share my respirator than my tooth brush, but just slightly.
As for administrative issues, I agree lets keep this to a minimum. But, providing respirators for sale is no more difficult than providing sand paper for sale which is currently happening in wood shop. I’m not trying to poke a stick in the eye of any member or committee just a thought and if Parks is willing to work with us this could solve more issues in the future for collecting payment.
I ask just keep an open mind and let me see where I can get on this, instead of preemptively trying to block it.
My understanding is that getting people to actually ‘pay’ is pretty difficult, and hence a consumer of precious volunteer time.
I agree with Pierce and others, you can purchase a respirator from Home Depot, Lowes, etc… if you want one they are easy to obtain. Personally, I would treat sand paper and other consumables the same way.
I hate being on the side of a discussion where it seems like no one sees my point.
@wandrson I agree with the broader idea you are stating, BUT the Parks Pantry setup has been a large success to the best of my knowledge. I remember hearing second hand that we haven’t had to deal with theft from members much or at all. This was second hand, so given proof of the contrary will sway me away from this idea as it seems we have dealt with theft from other items around the space.
I buy items from Parks Pantry, I could go to the store or gas station or even Home Depot and get my snack and energy drink. But, when I’m at DMS I tend to buy from PArks Pantry or deal without. If Parks Pantry had a respirator for sale at $15 and I forgot mine at home or at the office (just down the street), I would probably just buy another on the spot at DMS rather than leave to get mine or head to home depot for another. Once I owned 5 plus respirators, I would question my decisions and possibly drive to get mine, but it would still be nice to have.
Ease of payment is number one in getting paid. Parks Pantry has a full feature payment kiosk in the space. If we can use their system to sell other items why not take advantage? This is an IF statement, if they refuse to add a single item to the kiosk then O WELL it isn’t meant to be. But, I don’t see the value gained in just nay saying or blocking the idea before even asking?
A commercial enterprise like Parks (or the local convenience store) has an expectation of theft. I suspect that if they say they are doing well with us, it simply means that the level of theft is at or below their stated expectation. Not that no theft is occurring. I will say that I find the Parks system to be relatively poor. It isn’t unusual for me to not find any bottled water in the fridge (I only drink water). Indeed, the weekend before last, I couldn’t find a bottle less then a half hour after a Parks employee was there ‘restocking’…
I disagree. Our prior pantry system was about as easy as it could be for payment, yet we had significant loss from lack of payment. A payment cash box is about as quick and easy as it can be. Yet we have people not paying. A thief will be a thief as long as they believe they can get away with it.
I just don’t believe we should be doing anything that increases our need to monitor for thieves. We have enough work in that area as it is.
I disagree as well. Our old system only offered payment via Cash in person. The Parks Pantry system is much easier for making payment, it accepts Cash, Credit Cards, Pre-Paid Cards, and Rolling Tally Cards. It also supports exact payment not just a what cash you have on you. Much easier, in fact I had to make a purchase of $3+ Sunday to purchase water for the guys cutting wood and I had zero cash on my person, I just rang up the items and swiped my credit card.
Lets not conflate Ease of Purchase and over all services provided. Parks can have the easiest POS terminal to use ever and never restock items thus making the service useless.
Our old system offered cash payment as well as an accounting tool to pay $5 and know when you needed to add additional funds. In my opinion that is as easy as it gets.
The parks tally system has problems, but they are in favor of Parks. The other day I went to purchase a couple of items and was told the total was $5.89 while I only had $5.60 in my account. So I added $50, plus the $3 bonus dollars. So at this point I should have $58.60 in my account. I reran my purchase and was told I had about $46 left over… I have yet to receive a emailed receipt…
Personally, I believe we should simply get out of the business of selling consumables altogether. If we have any theft, whatsoever, all we (the ones who actually pay) are doing is subsidizing those who are stealing.
