Manth Brownell Focuses on Lean Initiative
Recently Manth Brownell paired with one of its customers to focus on a new lean initiative to reduce inventory and packaging costs. The goal was to support the customer in implementing their visual inventory system that would not only benefit the customer, but Manth Brownell, as well.
Manth Brownell hosted a Kaizen with the customer in the CNC area help jump-start the process. The customer demonstrated their pull system and returnable packaging that is used with several of their other vendors. The pull system would require more frequent shipments of smaller quantities, using returnable packaging. The cost of the returnable packaging would be shared between the customer and Manth-Brownell, with significant savings realized in the reduction in use of cardboard boxes and special dividers.
Though there is still much work to be done to complete this particular lean initiative, the project is scheduled for completion sometime in the early part of 2011. Manth Brownell continues to look for ways to lean their own processes and looks for ways to assist customers to help them do the same.
