ONE COMPANY WAS PREPARED
September 3, 2005

By SAM GUSTIN

With the Gulf Coast economy crippled by Hurricane Katrina, one New Orleans-based company is sitting high and dry thanks to an aggressive disaster preparedness system that it put in place after 9/11.
Last Sunday at 4 p.m., as Katrina bore down on the Gulf Coast, New Orleans-based SCP Pools, the world's largest distributor of swimming pool supplies, declared an impending disaster and triggered its contingency plan, according to Mike Sullivan, co-founder of VeriCenter, which helped SCP design its plan.

SCP had already moved its data center from New Orleans to Dallas in late 2002, in an effort to protect the company's critical IT infrastructure, should a disaster befall New Orleans. Last Sunday just such a disaster was imminent.

"We immediately began relocating their call center from New Orleans to Dallas," said Sullivan. "Twenty-four hours later, by the time we had finished, they had gotten their critical personnel to Dallas."

"This week, the company had zero to minimal downtime for any of their IT infrastructure and critical systems," Sullivan said, adding, "All of their offices around the country are up and running, except New Orleans."

"It's a great example of an absolute success," Sullivan said. "It's an example of how you do it right. The company totally changed its behavior post 9/11."

SCP, which has a market cap of almost $2 billion, was recently ranked by Forbes as the 17th best mid-cap stock in the U.S.

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