Q & A What was a key win? Mike Carroll, Operations Manager “Primarily it has allowed us to focus on our direct labor. Every time we have our workers filling bins, we consider that to be non-value added labor, and having Fastenal take over that work has let our team be focused on their work.” “In terms of morale, it’s been a boost there, too. Employees have enjoyed having what they need right at the point of use where they are working. Having that hardware right there has allowed them to be focused on their job and have a big reduction in the interruption of their work.” When did you start seeing results? Joe Gfrer, Commodity Manager “We saw pretty much immediate results. There was a little bit of tweaking that happened and still can happen, but Fastenal has been so good at making those changes quickly and even suggesting ways that we can get more out of the system.” John Stevens, Manufacturing Manager “This lets us get more production out of the day. We can create more pumps per day and hour. It, too, created improved ergonomics for the employees. Placing their essential resources at the point of use.” How did the implementation process go? Joe Gfrer, Commodity Manager “The Fastenal team made sure we were prepared for changes before they even came up. They said they’d seen a lot of setups in the past and could pretty much know where things could go. This prevented a lot of things that could have gone wrong from going wrong.” Automated Bins RFID: A multi-bin system using RFID technology to signal when a bin is empty. IR: A point-of-use solution with IR beams that report current levels. What’s the most impactful change Fastenal helped you make? Mike Carroll, Operations Manager “The technology, the RFID and the IR bins, that was just above our expectations. It might be the biggest change for us. The data we receive – the min/maxes, the amounts, the restocks – all of it helps us know what’s happening in the process. And Fastenal already knows what they need to restock because they have that data.” Joe Gfrer, Commodity Manager “It’s just one less thing that we need to manage. It lets us focus on what we should be working on, making pumps for customers. The technology makes it easier for us to focus on our customers’ needs more. We, as a company, are very customer-driven and focused. Our main goal is to overserve our customers each and every day. We create high quality products; these pumps are world class.”
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