“We replaced multiple disconnected safety systems with one platform. Novara Flex finally gave us a single source of truth for inspections, maintenance, and documentation.”
Client Profile
Grain Handler Operates High-Risk Multi-Facility Operations Across U.S. and Canada
Michigan Agricultural Commodities, Inc. is a large grain handling and marketing organization that helps with purchasing grain from local farmers, managing drying and storage operations, and selling grain to end users. Their operations include truck loading and unloading, bin storage, grain drying to prevent mold, and extensive equipment use across multiple facilities. As a KPA Flex customer in the agriculture industry, they’ve been utilizing the platform for over two years to simplify their safety operations.
With over 215 employees across the U.S. and Canada (approximately 140 in Michigan and 75 in Canada), the organization operates in a high-risk environment involving heavy machinery, transportation, and hazardous working conditions. All of this requires strict regulatory compliance and strong safety oversight.
When Brandon Lidster joined the company two years ago, he was tasked with building their safety program from the ground up after years of fragmented ownership under operations leadership.
Challenge
Four Disconnected Systems Create Compliance Risks and Inefficiencies
Before implementing KPA, Michigan Agricultural Commodities relied on four separate, disconnected safety systems, including the DEKRA/RCI Safety Management System for hours tracking, document control, and policy management—along with additional tools for inspections. These multiple disparate systems resulted in employee confusion over how to navigate between platforms, manual weekly printouts, and administrative data entry.
Multiple systems also led to poor documentation follow-through and inconsistent audit trails, limiting the safety team’s real-time visibility into inspections, maintenance, and incidents.
“Preventive maintenance and inspections were tracked manually or across separate tools (sometimes even just written on a piece of paper), making it difficult to analyze repair trends or justify equipment spend. Documentation lived across paper, tablets, and handwritten reports, which could’ve created a major OSHA compliance risk had we continued to operate like that,” shared Brandon.
As Brandon summarized it, the DEKRA/RCI system was technically functional, but not usable at scale or simple for frontline employees. Employees couldn’t tell what part of the system they were in, policies were difficult to access, and preventive maintenance workflows required manual workarounds.
“Our biggest thing is that the preventive maintenance manager wants to know why we’re spending so much money on equipment and repairs, but now that we’re using preventive maintenance and tracking it all through KPA Flex, our cost per repair has gone down significantly,” shares Brandon.
“Tracking preventive maintenance in KPA Flex has significantly lowered our cost per repair. We can finally show how routine inspections reduce unplanned spend.”
Solution
KPA Flex Consolidates All Safety Operations into One Configurable Platform
Michigan Agricultural Commodities selected KPA Flex to fully replace the DEKRA/RCI system and consolidate all safety operations into one platform. Their priorities were improving data capture, simplifying workflows, and increasing documentation follow-through across high-risk grain operations. Brandon evaluated four other solutions before choosing KPA—assessing configurability, ease of use for field teams, reporting capability, and total cost of ownership. These options included Safety 101, Velocity, and Intelex.
Competing systems came in at higher price points and required more rigid configurations or outside consulting support. KPA offered a system Brandon’s team could tailor themselves, with intuitive workflows for frontline employees and strong reporting for leadership—at a cost aligned with their operational needs.
“We reviewed a bunch of other options, but they were very expensive, and KPA was a much better option for us. The user-friendliness of the system gave us a blank slate to build exactly what we needed and easily track data 24/7. And now there are even more agriculture customers using KPA!” shares Brandon.
“KPA Flex let us consolidate DEKRA/RCI and every other legacy tool into a single, streamlined workflow. It changed how we capture data and made safety manageable for the entire organization.”
KPA was deployed in phases beginning in 2023, with full operational adoption in 2024. Brandon rolled it out first to safety coordinators, then office managers, and ultimately across the field workforce. Over time, he fully migrated:
- All safety policies and documentation into KPA’s Resource Center
- Preventive maintenance and inspections into fully digital workflows
- Permit writing, audits, SDS management, and incident tracking into one centralized system
A key driver of adoption was KPA Flex’s QR-code reporting feature, which allowed field employees to instantly submit inspections or incidents without any paper process. Management gained immediate dashboard visibility without waiting for month-end reports.
Result
Significant Cost Reductions and Cultural Transformation in Year One
Since consolidating all safety operations in KPA, Michigan Agricultural Commodities has experienced both cultural and financial improvements across the organization.
Key outcomes include:
- 100% replacement of the DEKRA/RCI system and three additional legacy tools
- Significant reduction in cost per equipment repair due to proactive preventive maintenance tracking
- Real-time audit visibility, enabling immediate review rather than manual monthly processes
- Improved documentation compliance, strengthening OSHA readiness
- A stronger reporting culture, replacing fear-based avoidance with proactive safety participation
- Centralized dashboards for leadership and operations
- Measurable cost improvements tied to preventive maintenance trends
KPA’s Biggest Benefit
Ultimately, KPA Flex was chosen because of its simplicity and flexibility as decisive differentiators. Unlike more rigid, template-based platforms they evaluated, KPA offered a true blank slate that Brandon could configure entirely around their real-world grain operations without being forced into pre-built workflows.
The KPA Flex system is:
- Plug-and-play for frontline employees
- Flexible for safety leadership
- Designed to improve visibility into operations and reduce costs
- Fully configurable for unique agricultural use cases
- Built for real-time data capture—not manual cleanup later
Brandon also emphasized the strength of customer support.
“Implementation and customer service of KPA Flex was amazing. Our KPA customer rep keeps up with me weekly to ensure we get everything we need,” shares Brandon.
“Implementation and customer service of KPA Flex was amazing. Our KPA customer rep keeps up with me weekly to ensure we get everything we need.”
What’s Next
The next phase of deployment will focus on greater adoption at the organization’s Canadian location. Brandon’s team plans to continue customizing the KPA Resource Center to support cross-border regulatory needs and extend rollout across Canadian operations.
Since these facilities fall under federal Canadian regulations, Brandon will work alongside KPA’s customer team to expand secure document control workflows for multinational compliance.
KPA’s product team continues to collaborate closely with Michigan Agricultural Commodities to adapt features to their evolving requirements as they scale their safety program across North America.
