Reduces 22 fork trucks and delivers more products to the line with only three tuggers
Matt Parenteau, industrial sales engineer with Topper Industrial, shared that a customer, a Minnesota manufacturer who builds electronic panels, started eliminating fork trucks inside the production and assembly areas four years ago. Parenteau said, “We were able to provide them with our unique one of a kind walk-through Mother/Daughter system. They purchased six walk-through mother carts and about a hundred (100) daughter carts of various sizes. They were able to reduce 22 fork trucks and deliver more products to the line with only three tuggers.”
While the safety benefits of Fork Truck Free operations heralded the initial push for the trend, when companies experience significant savings, rapid ROI (return-on-investment) — payback with seven months, the purchase decision is rather simple.
View the Topper Industrial Mother/Daughter system at: http://bit.ly/1lGvfPu
Of course the improved safety data was substantiated; the Minnesota company has had zero injury reports since fork trucks have been eliminated. They were able to move nineteen fork truck drivers into more value added positions. The company has had the system for four years now and has only spent about $600 on spare parts (mostly due to tugger drivers fault not failure due to parts wearing out).
With trained fork truck driver wages increasing an average of 25% YOY (year over year) according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, CFOs, Operations Managers, Plant Managers, and Engineers are looking for proven methodologies for driving improved profitability and throughput. The prognosis for 2016 – 2018 Fork Truck Free manufacturing plants is exceptional.
Topper brings companies considering a Fork Truck Free operation to various customer sites for benchmarking; to arrange an on-site benchmarking session call 800-529-0909.
Visit Topper Industrial at MODEX 2016. To view video, go to: http://www.modexshow.com/attendees/youroneminute.aspx.
By Thomas R. Cutler, Manufacturing Journalist for Topper Industrial – Material Handling Solutions