Hard hats and steel-toed shoes don't usually lead to thoughts of custom boutiques. Yet for many higher-exposure and hard-to-place workers' compensation accounts, a specialty-niche approach to managing risk is a natural evolution.

Much of the insurance industry has taken a “big-box” approach to products—and, more importantly, services—to contain costs and homogenize distribution. This one-size-fits-all delivery of policies and risk- management solutions, however, is not the best approach to customers in industries where workers' comp premium is a major budget component.

In these industries, which include waste reduction and recycling, contracting operations involving excavation and heavy equipment, as well as select types of transportation fleets, “severity potential” naturally attracts higher rates.