The Tale of the Red Swords
October 29, 2009 at 10:31 pm | Posted in Business Improvement Fairy Tale Series | Leave a commentTags: flow systems, Lean Thinking, process improvement
Once upon a time there was a company that made swords in Michigan. They made very good swords and people from all over wanted their swords. But the company had one problem: they had one very large customer that ordered many, many red swords at one time. When this happened all the company could do was make those red swords, they couldn’t make any more blue or black swords. So, the company made blue and black swords and stored them so they would have them to sell while they made the red swords.
This created the waste of Overproduction. The company had to buy and store extra material and finished swords, and then they had to find them when they were needed.
When the king came to the factory and saw all of the blue and black swords stacked up around the factory he declared “There shall be no more overproduction in my factory!” .
By applying the Lean Manufacturing concepts for a Flow System and exploring the root cause it was determined that the customer didn’t need their red swords all at one time, but just placed their order like that for ease. The company’s problem with overproduction was solved without any additional investment, just a change in processes.
After that, the red swords were scheduled along with the current orders for blue and black swords and throughput at the sword factory went from 30 days to 5 days. And they all lived happily ever after.
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