Ripcord Industries (Ripcord) is a manufacturer of premium parachute components, located in West Liberty, Iowa. Ripcord has been in business for 38 years and has been successful in most years. The 2020 COVID 19 pandemic has helped their business grow and, despite some minor setbacks, the growth has continued in 2021. As an outdoor activity that can be done locally and requires social distancing, skydiving has increased in popularity. The older population has been attacking bucket list items more aggressively during the pandemic, and younger people are looking for a thrill that a Zoom meeting cannot provide. Ripcord leadership has strong expertise in supply chain management and has been able to deliver their products to their customers without major disruption. This advantage has helped Ripcord maintain deliveries to customers during a period when many of their competitors have had trouble with consistent product delivery. The result has been an increased demand for Ripcords quality products. Ripcord has usually been growth-contained by a lack of available workers due to low unemployment. The beginning of the pandemic increased the opportunity to hire more workers and Ripcord took advantage of the opportunity in 2020. Despite the great resignation of 2021, Ripcord has generally maintained their increased level of workers. At the end of 2019, Ripcord had 300 full-time employees and by the end of September 2021, the company has 475 full-time employees. This staff increase has allowed Ripcord to double its production and do so without costly infrastructure changes. More of their non-production workers have been able to work remotely. While there have been some upgrades to the facility (primarily to ensure social distancing and worker safety), the main change has been in adding a second shift. Ripcord hasnt had any problems filling the second shift because even some long-term employees were looking to change their hours in order to accommodate their kids attending school remotely during the pandemic. They have increased their shift differential pay during 2021 to maintain appropriate staffing levels for the second shift. Before the pandemic, Ripcord leadership had strategically determined that the market for their products was growing. The Ripcord leadership foresees the need to continue to maintain its larger workforce post pandemic but is concerned about retaining workers and attracting new workers with low unemployment in the area and increased competition for workers.

As a smaller business, Ripcord has provided health insurance, long term disability insurance and life insurance to their full-time employees. (Ripcord also has a retirement plan, but it is not relevant to this situation.) The Ripcord leadership knows it needs help with its benefits strategy, so it wants to retain you to advise them on welfare benefits plans. Ripcords top priorities are to retain employees and to continue to attract new employees. Ripcord also wants to continue to make money

Ripcords life insurance is a group term life insurance plan in the amount of $15,000 for each full-time employee. Ripcord has gotten feedback that many employees would like to have more life insurance coverage, especially the companys higher-paid employees. Ripcord is willing to pay more premium for life insurance, but they want to keep the plan simple and make sure it is not discriminatory.

Provide your recommendation to Ripcord leadership on the group term life insurance plan.