Case History #1 – productivity tracking

Opportunity: Management and plant employees didn’t know until the next day whether they had a good day or not. Eliminating the ability to fix problems on a real time basis.

Actions Taken: A short interval scheduling system (SIS) was developed and implemented. Standards of performance for all lines were established and employee buy-in made them part of the solution. Daily posting of results against goals was established. A feedback system was put into place.

Results: SIS system allowed for hourly adjustments to production needs. Operating efficiency increased from an average of 50% to 85%. Mechanical downtime was reduced by 85%.

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Case History #2 – cost control

Opportunity: High rework levels severely impacted profitability. Excessive waste was being generated at the filling station (hundreds of cases per day).

Actions Taken: Reviewed crewing requirements and job function. Identified Direct Labor and Indirect Labor personnel and responsibilities. Identified machine problem that caused the waste. Spent money to repair the machine. Identified a crew of 45 people whose sole job was to rework defective product.

Results: Defect rates, on the filling line, went from +100 cases per shift to less than 10 cases. This generated a cost savings of +$250,000 per year. Elimination of the bulk of the defects allowed for crewing reductions and further cost savings.

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Case History #3 – manpower reductions

Opportunity: High union labor costs were making the company non-competitive in the marketplace.

Actions Taken: Reviewed payroll and line crewing schedules. Established crewing and line throughput standards for all products. Implemented a SIS program to track throughput performance on an hourly basis. Called plant wide meetings launching the new standards of performance program. Installed new processing and packaging lines. Implemented competency testing for all employees.

Results: Headcount (direct and indirect) was reduced from 350 to 175 employees. With manpower decreased by about 50%, a huge saving in administrative costs was realised. Savings: $3,000,000 in labor expense.

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Case History #4 – growth planning and execution

Opportunity: The seasonal grape harvest was projected to be at record levels, far exceeding plant capacity. The fear was that it could not be processed on time?

Actions Taken: A grape harvest preparedness plan was developed and implemented in coordination with QA, Operations, Maintenance and Engineering. Process flows documented all steps including all risk points with suitable alternate steps. Physical inspection of all risk points was conducted. 6 Weekly status meetings facilitated ownership and team building. Test runs and challenge studies confirmed reliability.

Results: 7 production records were set during the largest grape harvest in company history (40 days non-stop).

Records included:

• Largest harvest on record (~40,000 tons)
• Highest average tonnage per day (1,000)
• Highest peak tonnage (1,300 tons/day) at record levels
• Lowest level of mechanical downtime
• Best safety record for any grape harvest

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Case History #5 – communication

Opportunity: Lack of communication between departments was causing in-efficiencies in company operations

Actions Taken: Identified key personnel in each department as team members to focus on growth and customer service. Established weekly targets by department. Focused all departmental goals into company growth plan.

Results: Reduced COG’s by 40%. Implemented National expansion by adding 14 stores in 18 months.

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Case History #6 – productivity improvement

Opportunity: Operations was given the responsibility to increase productivity and improve customer service, but was stymied by resistance to change from support departments.

Actions Taken: Departmental meetings were scheduled to identify conflicts and next steps. Prioritization of requirements. Established relevancy for each department and how it affected supporting groups. Focused on results and overcoming obstacles to change. Treated obstacles as a symptom not the problem.

Results: Intradepartmental communication was enhanced. Productivity increased through improved scheduling and waste reduction. Increased gross profit by $4,300,000.

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