cnc
technology
The reorganized plant floor in Lacey
has plenty of room for expansion and
flexibility. Batch size is regulated to
ensure smooth flow through the plant.
Insourcing to
improve output
College and government furniture
manufacturer tackles one small
constraint at a time on its journey
toward lean manufacturing.
by Karl D. Forth, Editor
kforth@chartcomm.com
(in sôrc ing)
The business practice of
using current personnel or
resources for new tasks or
projects.
In sourc ing:
••
'
Source: Webster’s New Millennium
Dictionary of English.
If your company isn’t outsourcing at least some
part of your operation, something’s wrong,
right? Not so, says Jeff Meehan, of R. T. London,
formerly R. T. London-Norse. “If we can insource it,
we will,” says the general manager of the company’s
Washington division. “Our goal is to shrink the lead
time and increase the throughput. The way to do that
is by insourcing.”
plant facts
R. T. London
Lacey, Wash.
Product: Casegoods for colleges and government
Employees: 25 in Lacey, 35 in Grand Rapids
Annual sales: $16 million
Plant size: 72,000 square feet (in an 85,000 square foot
building)
www.rtlondon.com
Insourcing is just one of several moves this manufacturer
of casegoods and college residence hall furniture has made to
make itself more efficient and infinitely more lean. As a whole,
the company has also immersed itself in books and movies
about lean thinking, it has worked to create an optimal batch
size for throughput and it has begun to heavily invest in new
machinery.
Previously, the company, which makes casegoods such as
residence hall furniture for colleges and universities, mostly
outsourced and assembled. When Meehan came to the company
in 2003, he looked at products the company could make in
house, then designed the process to accommodate that.
Meehan wants all employees to think like owners. In
Lacey, there are 20 to 25 employees in a 72,000-square-
