About

Formed “by lumbermen, for lumbermen” back in 1895, all we do is provide insurance solutions to businesses in the wood industry across America. We are not interested in straying from the niche but are steadfast in our commitment to serve you — the lumber dealers, woodworkers and organizations that support this industry.

Our business development and loss control representatives travel around the U.S. visiting thousands of sawmills, lumberyards, and wood manufacturing plants. Our underwriters and claims staff evaluate wood-related operations on a daily basis. We have the industry knowledge and expertise from years of experience in the wood industry to help make your operations safer and to handle your claims quickly and fairly.

As a mutual company, there are no shareholders – that means we are focused on our policyholders. With a shared purpose with our customers, we are committed to our mutual success and operate the company with our policyholders’ needs forefront in our minds.

PLM goes beyond the business of providing coverage and paying claims with an emphasis on preventing and reducing losses so our customers can focus on their operations. We don’t want to be visible to our customers ONLY when there is a claim.

Risk management is a significant part of PLM’s culture. We want to provide our customers with valuable, industry specific knowledge and resources to help them protect themselves and their businesses. Our loss control staff are individuals with extensive insurance experience and in-depth knowledge of the wood industry.

In addition, we have gathered an enormous amount of data and resources on the loss factors for this industry. We analyze loss trends year-after-year for our book of business. We evaluate the types of claims we receive and provide solutions on how we can help our customers protect themselves against future claims. We even have monthly large loss meetings where management teams from various departments (underwriting, loss control, business development and claims) take a deeper look into some of the larger losses we have seen on our books. They analyze and evaluate losses from every perspective, whether the coverages in place were adequate, if safety measures and processes were enforced, and what could have been done to prevent the loss.

In the end, we take the years of expertise and data and the knowledge of our business development and loss control representatives to work with you to figure out how to improve the overall safety conditions of your business or to supplement the safety measures you have already taken.

PLM stays true to its original founders’ intentions by remaining active in the operational, economic, and political affairs of the industries it serves. As both a mutual company and a provider serving only the wood industry, we have learned the importance of understanding our customers, their specific needs, and the needs of the industry as a whole.

We are a part of more than 55 wood-related associations across the country. We attend over 100 wood industry shows and events a year where it is not uncommon to see senior level management working at our booth. That is exactly where we want to be — meeting insureds, learning from industry professionals, and being available to help.

PLM representatives not only attend trade associations’ events and meetings but are also involved in the association on a deeper level. We have several people who serve on boards and committees for various wood-related associations throughout the U.S. We collaborate with many of these associations through sponsorships and education. We want to share our expertise and resources to support, educate and grow the members, organizations, and partners of the wood industry.

A company is only as good as its people. We train our entire staff extensively on the lumber, woodworking and building materials industries. We heavily encourage and reward continued insurance education to ensure that we employ a staff of insurance professionals.

Our frontline employees, from our Business Development and Loss Control Representatives to our Underwriters and Claims staff, are here for you to answer your questions and help our customers find the right insurance solutions for their businesses. We work hard on building relationships with our customers and brokers. Many of our customers are in the third, fourth and even fifth generations of their businesses, and we have been with them since the beginning. We have grown with them, and they have grown with us.

With PLM, you are never more than two people away from senior leadership, including John Smith, our President & CEO. He often gives out his cell phone number and encourages customers and brokers to call. What is more powerful for a customer to know that in their time of need that a PLM employee, senior management, and even John Smith, are readily available to take their call and be there to help?