NAID Briefing

There was a time, about 20 years ago, when there were only a few dozen serious secure shredding services in the country. One of them was in Chicago—Data Destruction of Chicago (DDC), which was sold long ago. In fact, the regional firm that bought them in the mid ’90s has itself been purchased by a global records storage company.

I recall comparing market conditions with John Mengel Sr., the owner of DDC, back in 1988. At that time, he said there were a large number of guys getting into the business, but that, thankfully, they were charging so much less than him that they really weren’t competition. I was puzzled initially but came to understand what he meant. If a prospect chose to use a firm with less security and less service, they were not buying a competitive service; they were buying a different service. In his opinion, it was his job to find (or to create) prospects that wanted his service.

Truth be known, that conversation was probably the origination of the idea for NAID.

Even in the face of heavy competition, secure destruction industry professionals can take a lesson from Mr. Mengel. They must define themselves and, thereby, define their competition.

NAID Certification is currently the best tool for defining competition in the secure destruction marketplace. Take a state like Iowa or a city like Chicago. In both, you have a few dozen (or more) companies offering shredding services—and that number is growing. However, in both instances, a handful of firms are NAID Certified. Whether they realize it or not, they are helping one another to create a credible, but limited pool of firms that distinguish themselves from the others.

This works best when there are more than a few. There needs to be enough—a critical mass—to have the net effect of suggesting that, "Yes, there may be 40 choices, but these seven or eight are the ones that should be taken seriously."