Lauren DeBow has spent much of her career solving wet processing challenges, including the last three years at Superior. Now, she’s bringing her experience to a new role as washing product manager.
We caught up with Lauren to talk about her journey in the industry, what she’s learned working for competitors and with dealers, and where she sees opportunities to grow our washing business.
I wasn’t leaning toward engineering and wasn’t totally sure what I wanted to do. My mom likes to remind me that I thought I was going to be a SeaWorld trainer.
Then, during my junior year of high school, I received a mailing from the Colorado School of Mines. There was no application fee and no required essay, so I sent it in and figured I’d sort it out later.
I initially considered chemical engineering, but once I got to Mines, I realized quickly that wasn’t what I wanted to do. My adviser recommended I check out the metallurgy program, and that led me to process flows and figuring out how to get the good stuff out of rocks.
It’s a different puzzle every day and I totally fell in love with it.
My senior internship was with a junior mining company working on an environmental remediation project near Denver.
When that project started wrapping up, I considered hard-rock mining as a metallurgist, but realized the remote mining life wasn’t for me. I would have been placed in a tiny town where the only two people my age there were already engaged!
Instead, I joined Weir Minerals, where I spent five years in applications and product management, including six months in Australia. Then, I moved to Astec’s technical sales group, traveling with dealers to troubleshoot equipment in the field.
Eventually, I was ready for something different and that's when I got a call from an old colleague who was now with Superior, John Rodriguez. I told him, “You guys don’t have anything on your website that fits me,” and he responded, "Just fill out an application and we'll make it work."
Coincidently, I’d met several people from Superior at a NSSGA Young Leaders event about six months earlier and had already decided that if I ever started looking, Superior was where I’d check for openings first. It all worked out really well.
For the last three years, I’ve worked in applications, primarily supporting our sales team and dealers with equipment recommendations. We receive information about a project, ask additional questions (especially in washing), and develop an equipment solution for the application.
This department gave me a frontline view of what’s happening. You see the questions dealers and producers are asking, the problems they’re trying to solve, and what's developing in the market.
Because of that, I have ideas about gaps in our product line and trends we'll start watching more closely. I also think the experience can help us identify ways to make the products we already have more useful for the evolving applications we’re seeing.
Washing is becoming more important in areas where producers historically didn’t need it.
That's because all the cleaner deposits have already been mined, so producers are working with material that contains more fines and requires additional processing to meet spec.
That’s creating new opportunities for dealers who may have traditionally concentrated on crushing, screening, or tracked equipment. Washing might be a newer conversation for them, but increasingly, it’s becoming part of the solution their customers need.
Water is another big one, especially in the western United States. There are places where availability isn’t what it used to be and regulations are increasing.
Water clarification is an area I think we should continue exploring. We’ve completed projects that involve clarification by partnering with others, but it isn’t currently part of our own portfolio.
As resources become more constrained, I think that capability becomes increasingly important.
The Alliance® Low Water Washer is what comes to mind immediately. As water becomes more of a concern in certain markets, I think that product becomes increasingly relevant.
From its inception, the Low Water Washer was directed toward manufactured sand circuits, but I don’t think we’ve fully explored everything it's capable of doing. I’d like to see more testing and analysis around natural sand applications, including determining how clean we can get material in a single pass and how factors like water pressure and screen aperture affect performance.
There’s a lot more for us to learn about that machine.
A big part of it will be asking dealers what they need, whether that’s better training, resources to help sell, or feedback on our portfolio.
Another opportunity for us to work together is competitive analysis projects.
When a dealer is competing for a washing job, we can break down the other suppliers and compare their approach with Superior's. That includes looking at the equipment, process, and application to help explain why we may be recommending a different solution.
The goal is to give dealers the information they need to clearly communicate those differences and confidently explain why a particular approach makes sense for the customer’s material and goals.
Getting a representative material sample can be especially valuable.
Producers are notorious for seeing another plant and assuming they need everything that plant has, but it might not be the right solution for their material.
A sample can tell us a lot: Does the material contain clay? Does it need scrubbing? Are there a lot of fines that will require additional water?
Understanding the material helps us recommend equipment based on what the application is actually telling us.
When possible, collect samples from multiple locations to develop something representative of the entire deposit. If you know where the extremes are, such as an especially fine or clay-heavy area, sample those too. It helps us understand what the plant may eventually encounter.
I’m really excited about it. I think we have a unique opportunity to make a big impact in the industry.
Superior has a broad washing portfolio, which gives us the ability to look at an application and determine what makes the most sense rather than making the application fit a particular piece of equipment.
I’m looking forward to building relationships with dealers, bringing new products and packages to market, and continuing to build out what we can offer.
Oh, and let's have a little fun too!