Lean Manufacturing Case Study: 
Security Products Company
Date: October 2010                            Sector: Security Products                          Turnover: £1m                            Employees: 12

1. The Lean Improvement Team

General Manager, 4 Operators






2. Objectives

  • Increase productivity
  • Introduce capacity planning
  • Improve costing methods
  • Introduce CAD drawings
  • Improve stock control
  • Improve staff morale
  • Highlight key areas for Improvement

3. Major Issues

  • Poor profit margin
  • Poor management controls
  • High number of quality failures
  • Productivity very low
  • Poor staff morale
  • No CAD facility to increase sales in public sector
  • Untidy factory causing risk to health and safety

4. Solutions

CAD Drawings, Custom MRP System, Structured Costing Method,  Lean Awareness Training, Improvement Team, Value Stream Mapping,  Waste Elimination, 5S Workplace Organisation, Action Plan

5. New Methods

  • CAD System
  • Costing Model
  • MRP
  • Capacity Planning
  • Stock Control
  • 5S Housekeeping
  • Improvement Meetings
  • Action Plan

6. The Results

  • Increased productivity by 89%
  • Reduced stock levels by 51%
  • Created bespoke MRP system via Excel to control stock, plan capacity and manage bespoke product costing
  • Developed a new website to market high margin products across the UK
  • Introduced new Employee Handbook, Contracts of Employment , Training Records and Job Descriptions for all staff
  • Drew up all standard product onto CAD and issued controlled drawings with all jobs for manufacture
  • Introduced 5S Workplace Organisation to provide structure to change and involve more shop floor staff
  • Set up Improvement Team & improved staff morale by giving them an understanding of the ‘Big Picture’ and including them throughout the project
  • Provided staff with training in various Lean Manufacturing disciplines
  • Carried out Risk Assessments to highlight issues in priority order based on risk to employees

7. Lessons Learned

  • More management meetings required to structure the improvement process around business direction
  • Major opportunities for growth in high margin products due to increased security risks in UK
  • Need 1 person dedicated to Sales to approach potential new clients with portfolio of products
  • Piece rate has proved to be very effective in managing cost of sales




8. Future Opportunities

  • Standard Operating Procedures to improve quality
  • Make approaches to Security Product distributors to increase sales
  • Consider robot technology to increase productivity
  • Improve supplier relationships and set up performance measures





9. Ongoing Support

6 months support on site followed by 1 day per week support.