Bendix Community Involvement Efforts Held Strong Through 2020

Press release from Bendix Commercial Vehicle Systems LLC:

March 12, 2021

During a pandemic year, Bendix and its employees continued community involvement activities through 2020, emphasizing both corporate giving and employee volunteering activities.

Corporate and employee donations for the year totaled more than $850,000, including $427,000 in grants awarded by Knorr-Bremse Global Care, and Knorr-Bremse Global Care North America Inc. Another $430,000 in funding came from Bendix and Bendix employees to support numerous nonprofit organizations and community initiatives across North America, in the form of grants, donations, and sponsorships.

Bendix Commercial Vehicle Systems is the North American leader in the development and manufacture of active safety, air management, and braking solutions for commercial vehicles. Bendix’s parent company, the Munich, Germany-based Knorr-Bremse, is the global leader for braking systems and a leading supplier of other safety-critical rail and commercial vehicle systems.

“2020 may have brought new challenges when it came to community service efforts, but challenging times bring out the best in people, and that was certainly evident across the Bendix organization,” said Maria Gutierrez, Bendix director of corporate responsibility and sustainability. “Our in-person volunteering hours were understandably down in 2020, as most of those events and opportunities were canceled to protect the health and safety of everyone involved. But we maintained our commitment to supporting our communities despite the pandemic and its economic impacts.”

Gutierrez continued, “In many instances where we had previously provided volunteers, but could not in 2020, we were still able to offer sponsorships and donations in lieu of our employees’ time. In fact, throughout the year we actually increased our core giving to help support those in need. We also evolved our programs to offer more virtual opportunities for employees to get engaged from the comfort of their homes and still positively impact our communities.”

Of the $430,000 in Bendix contributions, $55,000 was generated through employee initiatives and fundraising campaigns, while close to $138,000 represented Bendix grants from the company’s Get Involved! Program, which was maintained in spite of the impact of COVID-19. Additionally, some corporate grants were redirected to support COVID-19 emergency relief efforts in local Bendix communities. This support included donations to local food banks, primarily, and organizations working to close the digital divide related to the shift to online schooling.

Get Involved! Projects

Employee participation in Bendix’s Get Involved! Program was a high point in the company’s community service efforts for the year, with the funding of 49 Get Involved! projects totaling $137,500 in Bendix grants.

These project-oriented grants across Bendix locations are traditionally earmarked for efforts and organizations in which Bendix employees are currently involved. Launched in 2015 to honor the 10-year anniversary of Knorr-Bremse Global Care, the grants recognize and reward employees’ personal volunteer commitments to projects and organizations near Bendix locations; they support education, environmental protection, health promotion, or social cohesion. Approved projects receive grants for up to $3,500 to cover material costs.

Normally, the projects are required to be completed within six months of acquiring funds. In 2020, however, the company provided additional flexibility to Get Involved! grantees, allowing them additional time to use the funds to purchase equipment, supplies, and materials.

The program continued to resonate with employees during 2020, with grant funds once again being fully exhausted. This year’s awards brought the total level of Get Involved! funding disbursed over the last six years to $724,000, in support of 275 projects and engaging 130 employees.

Shining a Light on Bendix Volunteers

Even though Bendix employees’ community service hours were down in 2020, totaling 3,500 hours compared to more than 8,000 in 2019, employees still logged an impressive amount of time in support of local efforts, all driven by personal volunteering that employees continued to do on their own. For 2021, Bendix hopes to return to its customary level of participation hours with the addition of new virtual volunteering opportunities for traditionally on-site events. These opportunities are offered to employees through the Bendix Cares online access platform.

New programs include: the company’s Virtual Discover Engineering program, which exposes children of Bendix employees to STEM activities; at-home blanket making, where some 54 volunteers made and donated 184 handmade fleece blankets through a partnership with Fleece & Thank You; and virtual student project judging and mentoring opportunities, such as the Ohio Invention Convention.

In 2020, the company began sharing monthly spotlights of employees’ volunteer activities throughout the year to increase recognition of these activities. Among the spotlights was Bowling Green, Kentucky, employee Michael Butler, who continued to spearhead the Single Mothers Oil Change event through the Highland Hills Community Church. For the event, Butler, along with family members and other volunteers, provided free oil changes for single mothers, using grant funds to purchase supplies.

“We have always believed that it is our responsibility to help strengthen the communities we live and operate in, and in 2020, all of us proactively reached out to local nonprofits in our communities to help,” Gutierrez observed.

“I also personally heard of many stories of how employees stepped up to help during the pandemic. Each one inspired me and left me in awe of the kind of team members we have here at Bendix and R.H. Sheppard Co., Inc. We were truly humbled and proud to see how many employees continued to volunteer on their own, helping local nonprofits in this time of need.”

This press release was produced by Bendix Commercial Vehicle Systems LLC. The views expressed here are the author's own.