“I handle, store and issue nuclear parts to various departments to ensure the safe day-to-day operation of the plant.” The warehouse is essential at River Bend Station. It stores and manages critical spare parts, materials and equipment necessary for maintenance, repairs and emergency response.

Viola has been an integral part of the River Bend team for seven years. She spent her first five years with the security force and has been with the supply chain department for the past two years.

In her role, Viola directly contributes to River Bend’s success by ensuring efficient material flow through the supply chain. “By meticulously managing inventory and performing tasks safely, I help prevent delays in production, ultimately boosting productivity.”

Outside of work, Viola enjoys exploring new destinations and diverse culinary experiences. She cherishes moments with her children and two grandsons. Additionally, she is an active member of WIN and Delta Sigma Theta, Inc.

Viola values the strong bonds within the RBS warehouse and procurement teams, as well as with upper management. “We work like a family, ensuring the plant has all the necessary materials. When one succeeds, we all succeed.”

Viola’s dedication, attention to detail and commitment to excellence embody the teamwork and success at River Bend. Thank you, Viola, for your valuable contributions and positive impact on our safe and reliable operation.

#MeetThePros

Recently, Entergy joined four other utilities operating in Mississippi in co-hosting an event to help educate and connect local suppliers to utility supply chains.

Twenty-six diverse suppliers seeking to enhance their chances of successfully selling their products and services to utilities in Mississippi received important information and guidance at a session held in Entergy’s Echelon building in Jackson.

The four-hour event, called “The Power of Connecting,” was co-hosted by Entergy, Atmos ���ϳԹ���, CenterPoint ���ϳԹ���, Mississippi Power and Spire.

“This event gave members of our team the opportunity to discuss our strong commitment to supplier diversity and to build relationships with local contractors and suppliers in Mississippi,” said Kya Moller, Entergy senior manager of supplier diversity, inclusion and sustainability. “The attendees left with a much better understanding of what they need to do business with Entergy and the other utilities that joined us as hosts.”

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In the general session for all attendees, supplier diversity representatives from the utilities presented overviews of how to do business with their companies, and Mississippi Public Utility Staff Executive Director Jim Beckett delivered a keynote address focused on the significant impact that Mississippi-based utilities have on the economic prosperity of the region.

Beckett discussed , which is a rule that encourages public utilities to use Mississippi resident contractors and subcontractors. It was issued by the Mississippi Public Service Commission in 2017 in an effort to boost economic development and increase employment in the state.��

During breakout sessions, attendees visited with the utility representatives and networked with each other in small groups. Panel discussions enabled attendees to learn more the utilities’ individual approaches to increasing business opportunities with diverse and local businesses. Suppliers also had an opportunity to engage in focused discussions with procurement professionals about their capabilities and upcoming sourcing opportunities.

Many of Entergy’s supplier diversity advocacy partners also attended the event, including the Southern Regional Minority Supplier Development Council, Women’s Business Enterprise Council South, Jackson State University’s Women’s Business Center, Mississippi Minority Business Development Agency and the Jackson Airport Authority.��

Mississippi suppliers and contractors that would like to learn about Entergy’s qualifications and bid opportunities can visit entergy.com/operations/supply-chain/doing-business/.

“Our Super Tax Day events are an important part of our commitment to supporting our customers and communities,” said Nyka Scott, Entergy New Orleans vice president of customer service. “We understand that tax season can be a challenging time of year for many of our customers. So, we want to make sure they have access to the resources and assistance they need to navigate the process successfully.”

During the Super Tax Day event, customers will also be able to access valuable resources and information on tax credits and deductions they may be eligible for, including the federal Earned Income Tax Credit. The Earned Income Tax Credit is one of the nation’s most effective means of lifting Americans out of poverty. Entergy’s tax preparation volunteers will help customers determine if they are eligible for this and other tax credits, maximizing their tax refunds.

In addition to tax preparation, customers will also receive information on how to sign-up for Kids to College, a free child savings account powered by Entergy. When families sign their child up for an account through the Kids to College program, Entergy will contribute $50 and will match any savings in the account up to $365 this year.

Customers unable to attend an event in their area can still receive free, in-person tax preparation services by scheduling an appointment at one of the Entergy-sponsored Volunteer Income Tax Assistance sites, or VITA, through April 15.

Entergy New Orleans’ upcoming Super Tax Day date, time and location is as follows:

Saturday, Feb. 24, 9 a.m. to 3 p.m., University of Holy Cross, 4123 Woodland Drive, New Orleans, LA 70131

For more than 15 years, Entergy has provided free tax preparation for low-to-moderate income customers at VITA sites throughout the Entergy region, including locations across New Orleans.

Hancock Whitney Small Business Matters is a no-cost, comprehensive entrepreneurship program that extends the financial services and small business banking knowledge and experience of in-house experts with many community and business development partnerships offering small businesses more access to essential resources, including small business training, technical assistance, business capital and networking.

“Small Business Matters was developed to help meet the business needs of our communities with a focus on minority- and women-owned businesses, who too often face challenges accessing the guidance and support needed to thrive,” said Hancock Whitney Vice President Community Development Programs Ashley Aubrey Harrison. “Partnering with Entergy to extend Small Business Matters to its supplier diversity program is a win for both small businesses and our communities who benefit from the innovation diverse businesses bring.”

Serving four states across the Gulf South — Louisiana, Mississippi, Texas and Arkansas — Entergy’s supplier diversity and inclusion program aims to identify and promote the use of third-party-certified diverse and locally based companies for needed products and services across the region. The program’s intent is to foster economic development and grow a world-class energy business that creates sustainable value for Entergy’s four stakeholders — customers, employees, communities and owners. This partnership with Hancock Whitney will help enhance business capabilities in the supplier network.

“In working with our diverse and local supplier network, we see the challenges businesses face,” said Kya Moller, Entergy senior manager of supplier diversity, inclusion and sustainability. “This relationship with Hancock Whitney will allow us to support our network even further. This program will help connect businesses, no matter what stage they are in, with a local financial partner that can guide them and identify ways to grow, fund or manage their business for ongoing success.”

Moller shares that working with Hancock Whitney on this initiative made sense because of three distinct intersection points — both organizations serve overlapping geographies, are community-minded and understand the impact of diverse and local business success on local economies and wealth creation in underserved communities.

Harrison agrees. “We know that communities thrive when businesses thrive, so we are committed to being the conduit for entrepreneurs and small businesses to find opportunities for growth. Whether we are sharing guidance for a viable business plan, business management and technical assistance, training, and research to improve profitability and stimulate growth, international trade expertise, or small business banking services, our efforts are to help businesses sustain success.”

Entergy’s diverse and local suppliers that expressed an interest in access to capital services were invited to attend Capitalize 2023 New Orleans, an event hosted at the University of New Orleans by the Louisiana Small Business Development Center and sponsored by Hancock Whitney. Hancock Whitney and Entergy will continue to make virtual and in-person training opportunities available to program participants throughout the fall.

For more information on Hancock Whitney Small Business Matters, visit . To learn more or apply as an Entergy diverse supplier, visit entergy.com/operations/supplier-diversity.

About Hancock Whitney

Since the late 1800s, Hancock Whitney has embodied core values of Honor & Integrity, Strength & Stability, and Commitment to Service, Teamwork, and Personal Responsibility. Hancock Whitney offices and financial centers in Mississippi, Alabama, Florida, Louisiana, and Texas offer comprehensive financial products and services, including traditional and online banking; commercial and small business banking; private banking; trust and investment services; healthcare banking; and mortgage services. The company also operates loan production offices in Nashville, Tennessee, and the greater metropolitan area of Atlanta, Georgia. More information is available at .

About Entergy

Entergy is a Fortune 500 company that powers life for 3 million customers through our operating companies in Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi and Texas. We’re investing in the reliability and resilience of the energy system while helping our region transition to cleaner, more efficient energy solutions. With roots in our communities for more than 100 years, Entergy is a nationally recognized leader in sustainability and corporate citizenship. Since 2018, we have delivered more than $100 million in economic benefits each year to local communities through philanthropy, volunteerism and advocacy. Entergy is headquartered in New Orleans, Louisiana, and has approximately 12,000 employees.��Learn more at entergy.com��and follow @Entergy on social media. #WePowerLife

The supplies were originally purchased in 2019 and 2020 for use by employees in Entergy’s offices and plant facilities but remained stored in company warehouses since most employees worked remotely because of the COVID-19 pandemic.

“Ordinarily, supplies like these would be stored initially in the warehouses after purchase and delivered over time to our facilities, but for most of 2020 and 2021 the amount of these supplies needed for our facilities dropped as the pandemic persisted and many employees worked from home,” said Eddie Allemore, Entergy’s manager, supply chain warehouse operations. “We needed the space those supplies were occupying for storm readiness and other requirements, plus the supplies needed to be used before their expiration dates.”

Entergy donated the supplies to nonprofits on the frontline that serve, feed and educate our communities – especially during the COVID-19 pandemic and a period of high inflation. Entergy’s supply chain and corporate social responsibility groups worked together to choose the community partners that received the supplies.

The nonprofits and the value of the donations they received included:

• Culture Aid NOLA – $61,890: This organization’s mission is to direct no-barrier, no-stigma aid to underserved members of New Orleans’ cultural community with dignity, grace and hospitality. CAN launched in March 2020 as a collaborative between several cultural service nonprofits to combat food insecurity heightened by the pandemic.
• Second Harvest/Feeding America food network – $325,374:
• Feeding America is the largest charity working to end hunger in the United States. It partners with food banks, food pantries and local food programs across the country to bring food to people facing hunger.
• Second Harvest is the largest charitable anti-hunger network in South Louisiana. Its mission is to end hunger by providing food access, advocacy, education and disaster response.
• Educare New Orleans – $184,576: Educare New Orleans is the first early childhood development and education facility of its kind in the Gulf South. It is a national network of early learning schools which share a platform to leverage strong and lasting investments in early childhood education for low-income families.
• United Way of Southeast Louisiana – $87,200: United Way SELA provides funding to programs, collaboratives and initiatives serving the people of Jefferson, Orleans, Plaquemines, St. Bernard, St. Tammany, Tangipahoa and Washington parishes.
• New Orleans Recreation Development Foundation – $35,001: The NORD Foundation is a nonprofit organization that raises funds to support the activities of the New Orleans Recreation Development Commission.

The supplies were distributed to six Entergy community partners in greater New Orleans and to the Feeding America Food Network, which serves affiliate food banks across the country.

Entergy is committed to creating a cleaner, more sustainable energy future for all our stakeholders. The supply chain organization is helping Entergy carry out this commitment by integrating environmental, social and governance practices into its management strategy. The organization recently received national recognition as the 2022 Utility Member of the Year from the Sustainable Supply Chain Alliance. Learn more about our sustainability commitments at entergy.com/sustainability.

To be considered for the award, Entergy submitted a case study that demonstrated “especially strong leadership” among utilities in elevating environmental, social and governance, or ESG, performance as part of its supply chain management strategy.

Entergy’s supply chain organization manages an investment recovery program that aims to obtain the best return for assets that the company no longer needs. Instead of disposing of retired assets in landfills, the program facilitates recycling and repurposing of those assets and components, selling surplus assets, and assessing market conditions and trends to ensure Entergy receives the maximum value in investment recovery sales. This ultimately benefits our customers.

Entergy has achieved strong results for investment recovery and print paper reduction.

“We’re increasing our emphasis on encouraging suppliers to complete our annual sustainability assessment – and establishing metrics and targets for year-over-year improvement in this space,” said Mike Atwater, manager, supply chain sustainability. “We’ve also adjusted sourcing and procurement policies to align with our ESG performance. And we’re joining networks to support and develop supplier ESG education and best-practice programs in the utility industry.”

Similar to fostering a culture of safety, “the intent is to make ESG a daily standard way of working for us across almost everything we do, in alignment with our corporate commitments and objectives,” said Atwater.

The SSCA award recently was presented to Entergy. Pictured above at the awards ceremony are, from left, Pardeep Gill, vice president of the SSCA executive committee and, from Entergy, Jason Rees, director, supply chain commercial operations; Kaleb Stargel, project lead, supplier diversity and sustainability; Mike Atwater; and Lesley Lucas, senior sustainability analyst, sustainability and environmental policy.

is composed of 28 electric utility members across North America and includes over 60 supplier affiliate members. Its combined electric utility supplier spend is more than $120 billion. The members of SSCA contribute the equivalent of 35 million tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere through their operations. Collectively, the members annually divert over one billion pounds of material from landfill. All are working together across utilities and suppliers to reach climate and net-zero goals in the next few years. See the 2022 to learn more.

Led by our supply chain organization, Entergy has been on a path to increase annual spending with diverse companies for several years. But last year was the first year Entergy reached – and soon after exceeded – $1 billion in spending with diverse firms.

“We’re excited about exceeding the $1 billion diverse company spending milestone last year,” said Marlon Merritt, vice president and chief supply officer at Entergy. “We’re proud to conduct business with strong, diverse suppliers that reflect the communities we serve – suppliers that are safe, capable and demonstrate a commitment to diversity, inclusion and belonging, are committed to innovation and fair pricing, and are accountable for their performance. Everybody benefits from the ideas, innovations, products, services, perspectives and jobs that diverse businesses bring to communities.”

Entergy’s record spending with diverse firms in 2021 supported many companies impacted by the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. And Entergy’s commitment to supplier diversity helped to take our environmental, social and governance, or ESG, actions to the next level.

“We’re proud to conduct business with strong, diverse suppliers that reflect the communities we serve. Everybody benefits from the ideas, innovations, products, services, perspectives and jobs that diverse businesses bring to communities.”

– Vice President and Chief Supply Officer Marlon Merritt

Our supplier diversity efforts focus on businesses that are at least 51% owned, controlled and managed by minority, woman, veteran, disabled veteran and LGBTQ populations. Businesses located in historically underutilized business zones, or HUBZones, also qualify as diverse firms and are designated as such by the federal government.

The total dollars Entergy spent with diverse companies in 2021 more than doubled the amount spent in 2018. Most of the money spent last year – $1 billion – was with suppliers paid directly by Entergy. The balance was paid by prime suppliers that subcontract work to diverse firms.

A growing commitment by Entergy teams to use diverse companies for products and services contributed meaningfully to the increase in spending with those firms in 2021. Over time, Entergy has identified and utilized many diverse suppliers as part of its incident response efforts, and the outcomes have been positive. We seek to utilize more of these businesses on a year-round basis.

“Across the supply chain organization, we’re working to build on 2021’s great momentum in procuring goods and services with diverse firms,” said Kya Moller, senior manager, supplier diversity and sustainability. “To that end, we will continue to provide internal supplier diversity education to Entergy team members so everyone understands how they can impact premier utility performance and expand efforts to identify suppliers locally, regionally and nationally to not only meet our needs but power lives and better our communities.”

This award honors female supply chain leaders and executives whose accomplishments, mentorship and examples set a foundation for women in all levels of a company’s supply chain network.

“This prestigious industry honor for Carol is well-deserved, and we couldn’t be prouder of her,” said Marlon Merritt, Entergy’s vice president and chief supply officer. “Her knowledge, talent and hard work have had a tremendous impact on the success of our supply chain organization, and the team she leads has contributed significantly to Entergy’s overall success. Carol’s support for, and encouragement of, other women professionals across the company is exemplary.”

“As a multicultural female, I am truly honored to receive this award, and as a leader, I feel the responsibility to continue to focus on leveling the field for women not only in Supply Chain but across the enterprise,” said Hernandez. “I believe at Entergy we are uniquely positioned to make significant strides if we leverage the tools and support we have at our disposal. It might feel uncomfortable at times, but no meaningful change is easy.”

In addition to the electric utility industry, this year’s list includes individuals from software and service providers, consultancies and academia, trucking and transportation firms, professional development agencies, sourcing and procurement divisions, and more, all who have helped supply chain clients and the supply chain community at large prepare to meet many of today’s –and tomorrow’s – challenges.

View the full list of 2021 Women in Supply Chain winners .

Sustainability in supply chain is a growing expectation among Entergy’s customers, employees, communities and owners. Procurement offers many opportunities for improved efficiency, continuous improvement, environmental stewardship, risk management and innovation.

Entergy is recognized for its sustainability performance by the company’s inclusion in the Dow Jones Sustainability Index. DJSI names sustainability leaders based on an assessment of environmental, social and economic criteria, including a company’s supply chain sustainability strategy, management and performance.��Entergy is the only company in the electric utility sector to be included on the North America index for 19 consecutive years.

At Entergy, we are an industry leader in sustainable business practices. For more than two decades, we have acted to reduce our environmental impact while attracting and developing our workforce and creating prosperity across our communities. Now, we are doing even more to be a good steward of the environment and improve our customers’ lives.

Entergy’s supply chain organization procures everything from office supplies to large-scale equipment and services to support the operation of its power generation facilities. It plays a key role in meeting our commitment of achieving net-zero emissions by 2050. It is committed to securing effective partnerships, managing risk and ensuring that suppliers share our vision of a bright future.

For example, in 2019 Entergy formed a partnership with Xerox to launch the Entergy PrintSmart program to offset our carbon footprint. The partnership supports a global re-forestation program administered by PrintReleaf to plant trees in countries across the world. Through the program Entergy has planted 20,000 trees, offsetting the equivalent of printing more than 160 million sheets of paper since the partnership launched.

Entergy’s supply chain organization procures everything from office supplies to large-scale equipment and services to support the operation of its power generation facilities. It plays a key role in meeting our commitment of achieving net-zero emissions by 2050. It is committed to securing effective partnerships, managing risk and ensuring that suppliers share our vision of a bright future.

Our active role in the�� helps us promote sustainability best practices for ourselves and the electric utility industry.

We’re also incorporating greater sustainability measures into our new construction projects and our requests for proposals. This helps us identify partners who can meet our stakeholders’ expectations for more sustainable, environmentally focused results.

We use new tools and technologies to help us monitor environmental, ethical and human rights risks.��Our Supplier Code of Conduct is our baseline for sustainable supplier standards and practices, and we have an annual sustainable assessment program to engage key suppliers that measure improvements in key ESG measures year over year.

Entergy looks to suppliers for innovation in products, processes and opportunities to partner on areas of mutual benefit. Our 2020 partnership announcement with Mitsubishi Power demonstrates the kind of creative solutions to which we aspire.

A more sustainable supply chain benefits our company and all of our stakeholders. But it has an even broader reach in the world. Through thoughtful management and future planning, we support global initiatives to create long-lasting value for a better world.

To learn more about Entergy’s supply chain sustainability strategy and programs, visit our website.

Marlon Merritt is vice president and chief supply officer for ���ϳԹ���.

He joined the company in 2018 as supply chain’s director of capital project procurement and decommissioning. There, he worked to improve all aspects of supply chain and third-party interactions.

Merritt has 23 years of experience and expertise in continuous improvement, procurement and supply chain management across major companies in the energy and utilities industry, including Duke ���ϳԹ���, Progress ���ϳԹ���, Carolina Power & Light Company and Rex Healthcare. He has led business function transformations through the framework of continuous improvement that enabled sustainable value for stakeholders. Throughout his utility industry career, he has implemented enterprise continuous improvement and operational excellence programs with a leadership style that is both collaborative and decisive.

Merritt holds a bachelor’s degree in business administration from North Carolina Wesleyan University and an MBA from Strayer University. He serves as an executive officer and board member of the Utility Purchasing Management Group; Advisory Board Member for GiGi’s Down Syndrome Achievement Center; and the Industrial Steering Committee of the ABC Users Summit.