Then, too, our postage meter has a water reservoir and seals as it applies postage.

As a long-time secretary I’ve stuffed my share of envelopes, and neither of those choices represents the way I was taught to do it, in a few particulars.

Now I’m curious. What is the better way to stuff the envelope?

The lean solution to your machine issues would be to add more machines (or switch to machines that could
multi-purpose without any delays).

Its a straightforward calculation to determine whether the efficiency gained would be justify the cost. (Though, in our case, America’s 21st had to both calculate the equipment cost upgrade and expected efficiency improvements.)

As a long-time secretary I’ve stuffed my share of envelopes, and neither of those choices represents the way I was taught to do it, in a few particulars.

I may do another video where we make PB&J sandwiches in batch and then one piece flow using more of an assembly line. I may get my kids in on the action. We can then donate the sandwiches to our local soup kitchen teaching the lean principle of “respecting people.”

I am curious if anyone has ideas for how to compare one piece flow top batch production using aspects of your business (e.g. fashion, sewing, etc.). If you have any ideas please do share.

Thanks again everyone. All the best.

I think we’re beating a dead horse here. Given ideal conditions, lean is faster, but we don’t all operate in ideal conditions, and we have to combine batch and lean.

I don’t have enough machines to have one set up for everything I do. Sometimes I need 1 needle in my serger, sometimes 2. I’m not going to stop in the middle of a skirt (for example) and change the needle set up (which always requires testing the stitch, an extra step every time I change the threading) if I’m working on 3 skirts. I’m going to do all the 1 needle stitching on all of them, then change to 2 needles and finish all of them–except for the last step which requires me to go back to 1 needle. And there’s the sewing machine–same problem, different thread for sewing in labels than for the finish work on some garments. So I do a bunch of labels all at once. And then there’s buttonholes–same sewing machine, different set up.

It’s a pain with all the fabric handling…but until I can have a bigger workspace with all the machines set up as I need them, I just plug along being as efficient as I can be.

Bottom line for me is that I like lean when I can do it, but it’s just not always practical. Sometimes it’s just a matter of which I hate least–handling batch fabric or changing set-ups to do one garment all at once.

Kathleen, don’t be embarrassed. I think we all understand lean, we strive to be as fast and efficient as we can, and the interest in Mike’s setup is evidence that if we could have the ideal shop, we’d have lean! I know I would.

Marguerite

Average time to fold:
Batch: 9 s
Lean: 8 s

Average time to stuff:
Batch: 4 s
Lean: 3 s

Average time to seal:
Batch: 2 s
Lean: 1 s

Average time to stuff:
Batch: 1 s
Lean: 1 s

So, over 10 repetitions, he got a total of 10+10+10=30 seconds of advantage from the shorter time to fold, stuff, and seal.

The shorter fold time could be due to thinner paper, I’ll grant that. Or to the fact that he seems to get better as he goes (he starts out with times of 9-10 s, but ends with times of 7-8 s). The shorter stuff and seal times, though, are due to the fact that he is already holding the item from the previous step. He gains 1 second each time from not having to find and pick it up. That’s part of the point, and another lean production trick (SMED, the one that made Shigeo Shingo famous), so I contend that it’s unfair to count those against him as if they were a parlor trick of some sort.

Still need to account for 30 seconds, though.

He loses between 2 and 5 seconds every time he moves the pile around between steps. Also, he has to manage the pile several times during a task, something he doesn’t have to do nearly as much with OPF. This also has a factory corollary: storing, moving, retrieving, and looking for WIP.

But those are the wrong numbers to compare. The real advantage, though, is the fact that he is knocking out a complete product roughly every 15 seconds with OPF. Every 15 seconds, the lean manufacturer fills another order. Every 15 seconds, he has the opportunity to inspect WIP and final product for defects.

Heck, let’s even spot the batch production method the 3 second difference (most of which is legitimate gain) so that they both average 18 seconds. The lean producer would be still be fulfilling another order every 18 seconds. The Batch producer doesn’t get any orders filled until 3:47. What if they were hours rather than seconds? With 40 hours in a week, that means that the lean producer is shipping twice a week while the batcher is shipping every 6 weeks. Do you like the idea of cash flowing in twice a week, or every 6 weeks?

As I watched the video, I didn’t see any particular bias in the way he conducted his operations. I assume that both the batch and single piece flow could be further improved, but that wasn’t the point of the video. I’ll have to take a look and see whether I can detect any if I’m specifically looking to find it.

Someone mentioned that they could see single piece flow working in an environment with multiple workers (like here at Fit Couture) whereas it might not work as well in a single employee example.

I would counter that the opposite is true. At least in our case (and logically, it should hold true in most other cases as well), we would achieve our highest theoretical output by maintaining a 1:1 ratio between physical manufacturing lines and employees. We would probably still treat them as a team for bonus purposes to maintain the shared goals and camaraderie that TSS fosters though.

The “bumping” that occurs during single piece flow is wasteful. Its a big improvement over batch mode, but there is still waste there.

Any time our line is short handed, efficiency is higher than if its fully staffed. Indeed, I’m starting to suspect that our workers have figured this out and are starting to game the bonus plan a bit by minimizing the number of hours per day that the line is fully staffed (i.e. one worker comes in early and one stays late) to take advantage of that. In as much as it doesn’t force me to work longer days than I’m already working, I don’t really care. As the team efficiency increases, the stitchers make more money while our actual cost per unit drops.