Door Industry Journal - Spring 2021

47 THE door industry journal spring 2021 Also online at: www.dijonline.co.uk Domestic Garage Doors the workspace or even storing the different parts that are needed in a way that is more conducive to producing something more quickly. One area of improvement has been the section where they produce Canopy Track assembly; all components have been neatly placed into plastic boxes, the walking distance to reach components has been reduced and the floor has been painted to clearly delineate the production area. With everyone getting up to speed and each production area being optimised, another programme was put into place using the Kanban System. The Kanban system is a method for visualising the workflow of a particular part of a manufacturing process, so you can understand the actual work that passes through that process. This enabled them to only produce what they need, when they need it. Garador’s Managing Director, Neil Discombe comments: “We’ve used Kanban systems so we can speed up material flow and the production process.” The team have invested a lot of time and resources into the Kanban system. Garador’s Lean Leader has worked tirelessly with the production team to try to get things running at full capacity. Maintaining a clean and tidy factory environment is a never-ending journey. Sometimes things make their way into a production environment whose immediate use or need is unclear. On a larger scale, this can result in lots of unnecessary clutter across the factory. So Garador’s Lean Lead, David Burton, has put in place a red-tagging system where just about anything from pieces of equipment through to pallets of components, are tagged, logged onto the Red tag register and put in a special ‘red tag’ area until a decision is made with what to do with them. Neil Discombe says: “We want to make Garador’s factory more organised and less cluttered, and so we use a red- tagging system to eliminate any unwanted items. Thus far it’s been very successful.” This red tagging system has been further backed up with ‘Gemba Walks’ where Neil and his team regularly inspect the factory and look for ways to improve it. Neil says: “We are always looking for a way to continuously improve things on the factory floor and that’s where the Gemba Walks come in. It’s a really simple way to observe the actual working processes, talk with staff about what’s happening, gain knowledge and look for ways to improve things.” Getting the Garador plant’s production processes organised and optimised so that garage doors are manufactured more efficiently only solves part of the problem. If the changes that are implemented to the production environment aren’t maintained for the long- term, then gradually overtime things fall apart and you end up back where you started. As a result, the areas that have been improved undergo a weekly audit, which will help sustain the changes that have been introduced. In addition, each project will undergo a review every six months to make sure the improvements are sustained and to look for further ways to continuously improve how they manufacture garage doors at Garador. Find out more about Garador and the range of garage doors it manufactures by visiting www.garador.co.uk or calling 01935 443701. Garador’s Production Manager, Martin Best, and Lean Leader, David Burton, on a Gemba Walk at the production facility in Yeovil. Garador’s Lean Leader, David Burton, laying out a workflow process as part of the Kanban System. Inspecting items in the red tag area.