Assistance League of Long Beach

Just The Facts

Customer: Assistance League of Long Beach (ALLB)

Location: Long Beach, California

Challenge: Video surveillance, alarm system and motion detection for ALLB buildings.

Solution: Around-the-clock video surveillance and alarm monitoring.

Results: Integrated security system that allows authorized personnel to access the entire system from a central platform.

Customer Challenge

The Assistance League of Long Beach (ALLB) serves as a symbol of hope and assistance for the Long Beach community.

This nonprofit organization brings the community a variety of impactful programs, from providing essential school uniforms to underprivileged children through its Operational School Bell initiative, to vocational training that empowers individuals to thrive, to a thrift store full of reasonably priced items for those in need.

Dedicated volunteers and staff propel this mission forward at ALLB facilities.

Ensuring the safety and security of these individuals is of utmost importance to ALLB. As the organization expanded to a third building, they also realized the need to upgrade their security system.

“Until they added the third building, they had separate systems at every location. For example, they’d have an alarm system of unknown brand at one location, and a different alarm system of unknown brand at another location,” says Shannon Beritzhoff, account manager with Safe and Sound Security. “And then every location had a Hikvision video system.”

assistance league of long beach (1) — Source: Google Maps

Operating disparate systems had become a “challenge and a headache,” she adds. “They had a mix of volunteers and paid employees navigating these systems. When they expanded, they wanted to get everything under one umbrella. It was becoming too difficult to operate separate systems.”

ALLB contacted Safe and Sound Security to help them. Even though they already had a security provider, they sought a more responsive provider that used the latest technology.

Digging Into the Details

Safe and Sound Security uses the DRIP sales cycle process to collect more information on potential customers’ needs. With DRIP, D stands for Discovery, R for Review the Site, I for IT Review, and P for Proposal Review.

The discovery process uncovered additional details that helped Safe and Sound Security arrive at a solution.

“They told us they didn’t want to contract with their current provider for that third location,” Beritzhoff says. “In our discovery process, we found they had two other locations. We told them rather than compound these problems at a third site, it made sense to integrate everything into one solution.”

assistance league of long beach (2) — Source: Google Maps

Then, Safe and Sound Security reviewed each site to determine exact requirements. This involved photographing, identifying camera positions, and inspecting existing wiring for possible reuse.

The next step was the IT review, where the project manager presented a comprehensive map of the proposed security layout and asked more questions to fully grasp customer-specific needs, according to Beritzhoff.

As an example, they inquired about access control, asking: Do you want to use mobile credentials? Do you want to hand out an app and have employees and volunteers use their cellphones? Or do you want to hand out physical cards that you keep track of?

Safe and Sound Security analyzed these findings, created a proposed solution, and held another meeting to review the proposal.

“We had multiple meetings to design the system, look at the implementation plan, and things like that,” Beritzhoff says.

assistance-league-of-long-beach-3 — Source: Google Maps

The Scope of Work

Ultimately, technicians replaced the existing security system and upgraded everything to an enterprise level using the Verkada platform.

The work included installing access control at three doors and a video intercom system at the philanthropic center. All sites also received an alarm system with an Internet connection and cellular backup.

“That way if something happens on site and they lose power, they don’t lose communication with an important alarm,” Beritzhoff says. “There were a total of 11 doors on the alarm and 10 motion detectors.”

Technicians installed panic buttons at each site to give workers a quick way to alert authorities in an emergency. They also installed 11 indoor cameras, 10 outdoor cameras and three fisheye cameras for full surveillance coverage, she adds.

assistance league of long beach thrift shop — Source: Yelp

Unique Considerations

The thrift store is a unique environment that required a novel security approach, according to Beritzhoff.

The thrift store is stocked with collectibles, clothing, and various other item, some of which are hanging up. The hanging items caused a minor hiccup in the project. Whenever the air conditioning or heat turned on and blew on them, Beritzhoff explains it set off the alarm system.

“We had to look at where the motion detectors were placed so that this did not happen,” Beritzhoff.

In a separate incident, technicians couldn’t figure out why an alarm kept going off. They traced the problem back to a huge photo of a man and woman at the store’s entrance.

assistance league of long beach thrift shop (4) — Source: Yelp

“The image was confusing the cameras, and the system was notifying site managers that there were people on site,” she says. “Eventually we realized the sign was triggering the alarm.”

According to Beritzhoff, these learning experience will benefit future installations involving signage-heavy locations, like a career center with photos of people. “We always take the things we learn on one project with us to the next one,” she says.

Since the old infrastructure was removed and new infrastructure and security equipment were installed, integrating the system became unnecessary.

“We removed existing systems so they could get everything onto one system,” she explains. “The cameras were new, the access control was new. This was a full refresh.”

The Importance of Collaboration

However, the collaboration with the client was high because everything was new. “We had many lengthy phone calls to talk through how the new system worked and its features, so they could pitch the full scope to their decision makers,” she says.

Licensing issues were a significant factor that emerged during the sales process. The system needs an annual license, and with Verkada “there is a license for everything,” she says. “Every camera, every door, every intercom, every alarm system hub had a license.”

assistance league of long beach thrift shop (1) — Source: Yelp

An educational process was needed because the old system did not require recurring licenses, Beritzhoff adds.

“We had to show them that if you have a system without recurring fees, then you will have a camera system where the images are blurry and the cameras lack features such as facial recognition, line crossing, loitering and motion activation,” she says. “They would have a passive video system instead of an active system.”

With a passive system, if someone breaks into the facility during the night, managers see footage the next day. With Verkada, they receive immediate alerts about any unauthorized building entry. “They can see that someone is on site when there should be no one there, and that’s why cloud fees are necessary,” she says.

Safe and Sound Security conducted many demos to demonstrate functionality and benefits to help ALLB officials understand the licensing costs, she adds.

Eventually, ALLB chose to proceed and signed a contract, approximately 60 days after first reaching out to Safe and Sound Security.

“The only change we had was that ALLB required two people to sign the contract,” Beritzhoff says. “We had to adjust our PandaDoc to accommodate two signers.”

assistance league of long beach thrift shop (2) — Source: Yelp

Looking Through One Pane of Glass

With the same equipment being used at all three locations, the most positive aspect of the project is being able to look at the entire system through a single pane of glass, according to Beritzhoff.

“The person managing security logs into one platform. They log in once and they can see a history of everybody,” she says. “They can manage the volunteers. They can put in their profiles with a start and an end date.”

The end result is time savings. The system manager can add and delete user profiles and search video footage faster. The search for the person they are looking for no longer demands hours of sorting through video footage. Video analytics handles the search for them and completes it in minutes.

ALLB has the advantage of paying just one bill, rather than dealing with multiple vendors. They also collaborate with a single, highly responsive security team.

“They know that if they call or email, they will get a case number and the engineer will hop on to troubleshoot,” she says. “If they cannot troubleshoot remotely, they will come on site to repair or replace the device. With their previous company, they wouldn’t get a call back when they had problems.”