Our Standards Expertise
Clarion Safety is in a unique position to supply product manufacturers, workplaces, and public areas with the most up-to-date, standards compliant safety signs, labels, and markings. Over the past 30+ years, we’ve helped to write the standards you want to meet. Our involvement on the U.S. and international standards committees in this field is at the leadership level; perhaps nowhere else in the world is there more safety sign and label expertise – across a wide span of industries – than at Clarion Safety.
We are active member of the American National Standards Institute (ANSI) and International Organization for Standardization (ISO) standards committees. Our Director of Standards Compliance, Angela Lambert is currently a member of the ANSI Z535 Committee for Safety Signs and Colors, chair of ANSI Z535.1, and a member of ISO/TC 145, the committee responsible for the international standards for safety signs, labels, colors, and symbols. In 2022, Lambert was also appointed as a liaison between ISO/TC 145 and ISO/TC 283, an ISO committee that developed the ISO 45001 standard, which defines global best practices for workplace safety.
In addition, Clarion Safety actively participates in leadership roles in standards-related initiatives headed by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), the American Society of Safety Professionals (ASSP), the National Fire Protection Association (NFPA), Underwriters Laboratories (UL), Semiconductor Equipment and Materials International (SEMI), the Association of Aquatic Professionals, and the Laser Institute of America. Our safety and risk specialists regularly appear as featured speakers at industry safety conferences, helping to bring about increased awareness of best practices in the safety sign, label, and marking field.
Clarion Safety and ANSI
In 1992, Clarion joined the ANSI Z535 committee and in 1994, our founder, Geoffrey Peckham, was named Chairman of the ANSI Z535.1 Standard for Safety Colors subcommittee. Since Clarion Safety’s core business was the application of the ANSI Z535 standards and its staff has the opportunity to work with a wide variety of industrial customers to apply the standards' principles, Clarion Safety’s experience has served as the basis for many of the change proposals accepted by the Z535 Committee for revisions published over the last 20+ years. In 2009, Peckham was named Chairman of the ANSI Z535.2 Standard for Environmental and Facility Safety Signs subcommittee, the primary standard for safety signs in the U.S. In 2011, Peckham was appointed chairman of the ANSI Z535 Main Committee, the top standards leadership position in our field in the nation. In 2020, Clarion Safety’s Angela Lambert was elected chair of ANSI Z535.1. When Peckham retired from ANSI and ISO in 2021, Lambert picked up much if this important domestic and international committee work. Peckham stated that “By passing the torch to Angela and other committee members, the ANSI Z535 standards will continue to set the bar for safety communication best practices in the United States. I’m also confident that harmonization with ISO/TC 145’s new and revised standards will also continue to take place, because Angela and other Z535 committee leaders are actively involved on the U.S. TAG to ISO/TC 145.”
Clarion Safety and ISO
In 1995, work began in ISO to re-write the principle global standard pertaining to safety signs and colors, ISO 3864. At this same time the European Community was implementing compliance directives that various manufacturers needed to meet in order to sell products into the EC (e.g. The Machinery Directive). Driven by our customers' needs to fully comply with international requirements, Clarion Safety worked closely with ANSI to set up a TAG to represent the United States on the ISO committee, ISO/TC 145, responsible for revising ISO 3864. Peckham was named TAG Chairman in 1996, a post he held until the end of 2017, when he became chair of the full ISO/TC 145 committee. Clarion Safety is also a member of the U.S. TAG to ISO/PC 283, an ISO committee that developed the standard, ISO 45001:2018, Occupational health and safety management systems – Requirements with guidance for use, which defines global best practices for workplace safety. New guidelines and best practice implementations of this 45001 standard are currently still in development as of 2022 to include new COVID-19 and workplace illness provisions, which Clarion Safety members are actively providing input.
Clarion Safety understands that ISO safety sign standards are important to U.S. manufacturers for two reasons. First, we live in a world that’s evermore connected; a global “community” with an increasingly mobile workforce. Communicating safety across language barriers is essential if people are to remain safe when visiting or working in foreign countries. Second, if your products ship to global markets, you need to fully develop a safety markings strategy that satisfies the laws, regulations, directives, and policies of the countries in which your products are sold. Using international (ISO and IEC) standards is key to compliance. We understand the international standards related to product safety labeling very, very well. We were the principle author of the ISO standard for product safety labeling, ISO 3864-2. And we continue to be closely involved in the on-going process of standards revision and safety symbol registration that is taking place on an on-going basis by this ISO committee in charge of standards related to visual safety communication. Our knowledge in this field makes us a valuable resource to you because we can help you to make right choices with regards to your facility safety signs and product safety labels; choices that will meet either (or both) U.S. and international requirements.
Clarion Safety and SEMI
The semiconductor manufacturing business is a complex industry; the processes used to create silicon chips are as complicated as they are lethal. In 1997, work began in this industry to revise its safety label guideline, SEMI S1. Having headed efforts for the bakery, textile, woodworking and furniture-making industries, and because of his ANSI and ISO standards leadership positions, Peckham was chosen to lead the SEMI S1 Taskforce through its first major revision. Under his leadership, the SEMI S1 Guideline has served as a model of standards harmonization, meeting the needs of this global industry.
