a:Marketing Personal Protection Products - Part 1

An executive summary

Analysts Note: This executive summary gives a quick “snapshot” of the market segments addressed within a longer more in-depth study of the protective products marketplace; written by me. There, you will find competitive analysis of the leading companies, application sizes and growth rates and product analysis. Some of the information is dated. However, you will see some updates on this blog or you may mail me at Alexgski@hotmail.com for discussion or possibly a customized analysis of a specific product or market segment.


By Alex Strzetelski
This report examines the North American market for personal protection products that, in their many forms, protect the wearer or associated product from harm. Analysis is completed though the assessment of six major market segments. Emphasis is placed on market information, trends, new products and forecasts. Some technical information is provided for a clear description.

Summary & conclusions

The majority of protective products are designed to prevent the transmission of hazardous elements through a garment to the wearer or product. This report addresses six major applications: particulate protection, thermal/fire protection, medical protection, cut & slash protection and chemical protection.

As in most markets, some segments are growing faster than others. In the protective products market, medical products are the largest and fastest-growing segment while the cut & slash segment is the smallest and slowest growing segment. In terms of size, the entire addressed market shipped an estimated 3.5 billion square yards of fabric to the addressed segments (plus $100 million worth of cut and slash products) in 2002 and grew at an estimated rate of 7.5 percent. If the medical segment is extracted from the totals 220 million square yards of fabric were shipped at an annual average gowth rate of approximately 5.5 percent.

CHART
North American Shipments of Protective Products Forecast 2000-2005 (in USD)
Figures available



End-product summaries

Particulate protection

Fueled primarily by an increased need for cleanliness in manufacturing, particulate protection clothing has enjoyed significant growth over the last many years. For the most part, this growth was spurred by increases in cleanroom garments. New and emerging applications such as paint boxes and the deleading of older homes, however, contributed to an increase in penetration of all applications. Asbestos removal contributed significantly to production of particulate protection clothing but is a declining application as efforts to remove all asbestos from buildings are completed.
For the most part, cleanroom growth (over $3 billion in 2005) in the manufacture of electronics, food, and pharmaceuticals is responsible for overall particulate protection clothing growth. In other protective clothing applications, the clothing is designed to protect the wearer from noxious elements such as radiation or chemicals. In the cleanroom application, however, the protective clothing is designed to protect the product from the human operator. This is because the tolerances of product manufacture cannot withstand even the chance of one particle of dust, human hair or flake of skin. As the human body generates millions, if not more, particles every hour, it is the single largest hazard to the product being manufactured.

Cleanroom technology has also advanced and aided particulate protection clothing’s growth. In the past, cleanrooms were huge technical rooms that required tons of equipment and exceedingly complex systems. Today’s cleanrooms have become much less daunting, in a relative sense, but are non-the-less a complex system. Although this may appear to be oversimplifying what a cleanroom is and does it is accurate as new thin walled cleanrooms of varying sizes are introduced to associated markets. Additionally, the advent of these variable sized cleanroom units allows a wider net to be cast for those selling particulate protection products into the cleanroom segment.

Ballistic protection

The National Institutes for Justice (NIL) estimates that only 20 percent of active-duty police officers routinely wear their ballistic vests. Although this estimate does not affect existing sales of vests , it does suggest that vests could benefit from improvements that make them more comfortable. If comfort were increased, officers would wear their vests everyday and likely spur increased sales.

The need for ballistic garments, unfortunately, is not in dispute. Marketers do not have to work all that hard to sell their products; consequently, the market focus is somewhat different than other market segments. In this application the marketer is focusing his efforts on making sure that the customer buys the correct garment for their particular needs. If a customer buys too little ballistic protection, the result is obvious. If the customer buys to much ballistic protection, a potentially fatal overconfidence may occur or the associated discomfort may result in the garment not being used.

Companies producing ballistic fabric are small-to-medium-sized and relatively few in number. Competition is fierce between the leading manufacturers, and increased share is their battleground. With the exception of the United States the overall demand for ballistic protection has been slow in recent years. Peace keeping missions in several regions around the world, however, have stabilized the market to a degree.
There have been quite a few issues surrounding the United States militaries use of ballistic protection since the beginning of conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan. Original specifications were required that did not meet the realities faced in these conflicts. Further restrictions placed on families trying to personally equip their relatives has not aided in righting the grievous wrongs perpetrated upon military personnel by the United States military.

Production levels have since been upgraded to the new requirements of the military although full production will require some time. The differing levels of protection that ballistic garments provide have, unfortunately, been very visible in this regard.

Ballistic protection has a stable future in the non-military sectors. If anything the segment will increase as ballistic garment stories are heard from returning military personnel. Technology is an ever-present factor in this particular market segment with materials becoming lighter and more efficient at dissipating the forces of projectiles and blunt force trauma. No material is projectile proof but the garments of today are becoming better.


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