The soul of B2B

When everything stopped, what sustained us were the people.

 

I. The calm that heralded the storm

-It can’t be… it wasn’t even raining.

I said it out loud, looking at the laptop screen. The cameras were calm. Too calm.

-Watch the local TV and see what they are saying now,” I asked my wife. Nothing. Not a headline. Not even an alert.

-On the cameras it looks normal,” she told me.

-It must be in another area,” I replied. But I didn’t quite believe it.

The camera that was focusing our Konica Minolta stopped emitting. Digital silence.
“Maybe the power went out,” we thought. But that possibility began to ache in our chest.

Has the water arrived?

We are next to the ravine.
They didn’t say it anywhere, but we knew it. We felt it.

I looked at another camera, this time the alarm camera. Yes, it was working. But… was that moving? Was it water? Inside the ship?

It’s a good thing we put all the goods on palletsI thought. And that we disconnected all the equipment.

But the tension grew. The TV was only repeating the mid-morning forecasts.
Outside, the reality was already different.

-It’s over. The back door has burst. There’s more than three feet of water in the ship.
Silence.
-Oh, my goodness. In the middle of the campaign… with the moving stuff inside, too.

And then, the only thing that mattered was this:

-I’m going to talk to the team. I need to know if everyone is okay.

II. The instant the world stops

And so, in a breath, nature put us in our place.
Our ears stopped searching for news.
Nervous pacing between the balcony and the kitchen ceased.
The head began to work at a different pace, a higher, more urgent one.
As if a bull were chasing us down Estafeta Street.
As if life had sent us an ultimatum.

I called Fran, who is in charge of our factory in Andalusia.

-Get ready. We’re going to pull this off. Trust me. I promise you, we’ll get through this. Exhausted, yes. But like you’ve never seen us before.

These were not textbook words.
They were anchors. Shelters. Bridges laid.

I called Pedro. Sonia. To Ana, who barely had reception, but sent us pictures of her building with two meters of standing water on the first floor. Lifeless water. Water without a name. Water like a murky mirror that returned a washed-out version of the world.

We do not ask about agendas.
Nor for customers.
We ask for people.

And then, we started to build a solution.

III. Service first, then quality, then price

A phrase that my father kept repeating to me like a mantra kept coming to my mind:

“First, service. Then, quality. Then, price.”

I listened to him, wherever he could see us.
And I prioritized service.

The next day I ordered the immediate purchase of everything necessary to replace the lost material.
The quantifiable. And the one that cannot be counted.

Without thinking about costs.
Without calculating margins.

The objective was clear:
To devote all resources to supplying, as quickly as possible, the entire affected customer portfolio.

Not everyone received their products on schedule before the disaster.
But many did, and they were stunned.

The gears were working.
Begoña assembled a handling equipment in record time.
I closed a deal to occupy part of a main supplier’s facilities, where we also had our wire-o production unit.

The days ended as a long-distance race does:
with the sensation of having traveled a million kilometers…
without footwear.
No asphalt.

IV. Two lives at the same time

While we were raising production, weekends were for another war:

Emptying. To clean. To rebuild.

A friend of mine took a flight from Galicia just to get mud.
A paddler from Jaén helped free the access gates.
Every gesture was a story.
Each story, a reason to continue.

We live two lives at the same time:
That of responding to the year-end campaign.
And that of healing the disaster in Picanya.

V. When words change weight

Clients.
Transformed word.

Those who were not yet accomplices and friends became accomplices and friends.
And those who already were… gave us the embrace of a brother.
We were offered offices. Warehouses. Warehouses. Solutions.

Suppliers.
They did not hesitate to invest capital, means and understanding.
And also affection. Affection. Presence.

Friends.
Who got mud on their faces without thinking about it.

Volunteers.
Because when human beings bring out the best in each other,
dictionary words fall short.

VI. The soul of B2B

In these times where everything seems urgent and automated,
where the customer is an order number and the supplier is an electronic signature…

We experience something different.

We live the soul of B2B.
An invisible network of affection.
Solidarity.
Reliable.

A business network that does not forget that, behind every brand, there are people.
And that, behind every delivery, there are values.

“And then I understood that sometimes you have to wait for October,
for the fire to arrive,
and burn what is no longer worth,
and be born what we have not yet been.”

We are already being born again.

VII. The operational response: resilience with structure

Beyond the emotional impact, the key was to transform the chaos into a plan.

In less than 48 hours, we activated a contingency structure that allowed us to maintain service without a total interruption.
That’s how we got it:

1. Real-time customer service and management

A small team took charge of direct communication with clients.
Its mission: to beat time without losing transparency.
Each order was managed, rescheduled and explained with surgical precision.

2. Relocated editorial production

We moved the entire team to a partner facility.
We knew it. We were already operating there.
We scaled capacity, maintained standards and met commitments.

3. Double shift in the Wire-O area

We multiply product output by restructuring shifts.
Our closing machines operated without pause, adapting to the spiral pitch according to each model.

4. Handling and bindery support

We activate an exclusive support team.
Collection, special perforations, assembly…
We cover every critical need with flexible and efficient solutions.

5. Own independent logistics

We rented vans for local movements. Our personal vehicles have become essential for moving materials and finished products.
With the carriers collapsed in the area, we needed autonomy.
And we got it.

6. All as one: company culture in its purest form

The team left their desk to go into the warehouse.
Some were closing boxes, others were answering emails with headphones, others were organizing routes.
There were no hierarchies.
Commitment only.

Epilogue

What seemed like a catastrophe ended up being a declaration of principles.

A company can have good products, good prices, good processes.
But it does have a courageous team, humane customers and supportive suppliers,
has something more valuable:

It has soul.

By Ricardo Bayón Pellicer
General Manager of Global Leather Goods, S.L.U.