BRADY CORP

Narrative Description of Business

The Company is organized and managed on a geographic basis with two reportable segments: Americas & Asia and Europe & Australia. Below is a summary of sales by reportable segment during the years ended July 31:

Within each of the reportable segments, the Company markets, sells and distributes a broad range of identification and safety products and solutions across the following primary product categories:

•Safety and facility identification and protection, which includes safety signs, traffic signs and control products, floor-marking tape, pipe markers, labeling systems, spill control products, lockout/tagout devices, personal protection equipment, first aid products, and software and services for safety compliance auditing, procedures writing and training.

•Product identification, which includes materials, printing systems, radio frequency identification (“RFID”) and barcode scanners for product identification, brand protection labeling, work in process labeling, finished product identification, asset tracking labels, asset tags and industrial track and trace applications.

•Wire identification, which includes handheld printers, wire markers, sleeves, and tags.

•Healthcare identification, which includes wristbands, labels, printing systems, and other products used in hospital, laboratory, and other healthcare settings for tracking and improving the safety of patients.

•People identification, which includes name tags, badges, lanyards, rigid card printing systems, and access control software.

The Company markets and sells its products through multiple channels, including distributors, a direct sales force, and digital channels. Brady has long-standing relationships with a broad range of electrical, safety, industrial and other domestic and international distributors. The direct sales force within each region partners with end-users and distributors by providing technical application and product expertise. The Company provides access to its products through brand-specific websites and catalogs.

The Company markets its products under a variety of brand names:

•Brady: product identification labels, wire identification products, printers, software, safety and facility identification products, lock-out/tag-out products, brand protection labels, people identification products, and specialty materials

•Seton, Emedco, Signals, Safety Signs Service, and Pervaco: Safety and facility identification products

•PDC, PDC Healthcare, MAGiCARD, and Promovision: People and healthcare identification products

•Code: Barcode scanners

•Nordic ID: RFID products

•SPC: Spill control products

•Electromark: Identification products for the utility industry

•Securimed, Accidental Health and Safety and Trafalgar: First aid products

•Carroll: Wire identification products

The Company manufactures differentiated, proprietary products, most of which have been internally developed. These internally developed products include materials; printing, identification and tracking systems; and software. Materials manufactured by the Company generally require a high degree of precision and the application of adhesives with chemical and physical properties suited for specific uses. The Company’s manufacturing processes include compounding, coating, converting, printing, melt-blown operations, software development and printer design and assembly.

Competition is based upon several factors, including product innovation, customer service, breadth of product offering, product quality, price, expertise, production capabilities, and for multinational customers, our global footprint. Competition is highly fragmented, ranging from smaller companies offering minimal product variety, to some of the world's largest adhesive and electrical product companies offering competing products as part of their overall product lines.

These products serve customers in many industries within each reportable segment, which industries include industrial manufacturing, electronic manufacturing, healthcare, chemical, oil, gas, alternative energy, automotive, aerospace, governments, mass transit, mechanical contractors, construction, utilities, education, leisure and entertainment and telecommunications, among others.