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Optimize the workers you already have
You’ve got a well trained, willing work force, but are you giving them what
they need to do the best possible job? Optimize their productivity by making
small investments in the work environment. The ergonomic equipment
shown here is easy to integrate into most processes paying
immediate dividends by making work faster, safer and easier.
We could do a lot more
...but we could use a little help
Manufacturing
& Assembly
Stacking &
Transporting
Machine
Feeding
Packaging
& Palletizing
▪ 1. Calculate closely how many assets
will be needed. To determine your asset
requirements, it’s important to know
not only how many shippers are in the
system but also the assets’ cycle time.
How long will it actually take to get
reusable containers or pallets back from
the end users? How many should be
returned at one time? Is it worthwhile
retrieving five or six containers or pallets, or should the return be postponed
until a full truckload is built? Other
questions center on the consistency of
packaging volumes and whether there’s
a peak season for the packaging.
Understanding all these factors will
ensure the right amount of containers
or packaging units are on hand and
avoid the need to pay for expedited
shipping from the end user, says Knight.
▪ 2. Conduct a lifecycle analysis. It is
naïve to automatically assume that
reusables will be cheaper or greener for
the business, says Jack Ampuja, founder
of the packaging advisory firm Supply
Chain Optimizers. For that reason, he
urges managers to perform a detailed
eco-analysis tailored to their specific
enterprise.
“Go back to what the original raw
materials are and how they are converted
into the packaging product, [and] look at
how they come to your system, how they
are transported, what you do with them,”
says Ampuja.
Ampuja adds that it’s important that
the analysis cover issues surrounding the
packaging product’s end of life. For
example, many reusables are made out of
plastic. “But plastic doesn’t just disappear
when its life is up,” he says. “The [units]
can be recycled, but in many ways, they
can be much harder to recycle than
paper.”
▪ 3. Get supplier/customer buy-in. There
are some cases where companies are only
using reusables to ship between their
own facilities. Most of the time, however,
the items are being shipped back and
forth between the company and one or
more of its suppliers or customers.
In those cases, make sure suppliers or
customers are on board with the
reusables initiative. “Don’t go down the
path of doing the conversion [from non-
reusables to reusables] without mak-
ing sure your suppliers or customers
understand what they are doing and
the objectives behind it,” says Norm
Kukuk, vice president of marketing
for Orbis Corp., a reusable packag-
ing supplier.
One way to get partner buy-in,
says Kukuk, is to show how reusable
packaging will help them reduce
overall costs. Another approach, he
says, is to point out how reusable
packaging could support any objec-
tives they may have, such as com-
plying with new food safety
requirements from the Food and
