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Manufacturing

Lean & Agile

There was an old woman who swallowed a fly

Graham Birkenhead, July 30 2024

As I listened to this story, I was reminded of the children's nonsense song about the old woman who swallowed a fly - she then successively swallowed a spider, a bird, a cat, a dog, a goat, a cow and finally a horse, each to catch the previous one and solve the problems created by the previous creature - and then she died - of course!  It's easy...

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Lean & Agile

Not all Squeaky Wheels can be heard

Graham Birkenhead, July 16 2024

When we find ourselves operating in the 'here and now', a place to which our human nature causes us to gravitate especially when things get busy, we can end up in an ongoing reactive mode and a cycle where we are constantly putting out fires rather than preventing them. By responding to the immediate obvious issue, we don't see the bigger issue...

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Leadership & Management

Joining the Circular Economy

Graham Birkenhead, August 29 2023

The circular economy is an economic model designed to minimize waste and maximize the efficient use of resources. Within the Triple Bottom Line (Planet-People-Prosperity) model, this approach can make a significant contribution to the Planet consideration while ensuring the company's ongoing viability and Prosperity; it also can help People feel...

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Leadership & Management

Business owners, are you IN it? Or ON it?

Graham Birkenhead, March 14 2023

We are working with the owner of a $20M business that manufactures racking systems. Growth has been solid, and they have come out of the pandemic with a solid order book. Sounds good, but the problem is that they are having tremendous difficulty attracting staff, completing orders, and managing inventory in an overcrowded work-space. The owner is...

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Leadership & Management

Tips for Hiring Manufacturing Jobs

Jelena Franco, May 3 2022

So many manufacturers are hiring these days – or at least trying to. Our manufacturing clients are bouncing back after Covid with lots of new business, and their pipelines are full. Some are struggling to find components and materials, and many are wondering where they are going to find the people they need to keep up with the production.

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Market Strategy

How to Set up a Direct to Customer Sales Channel

Andrew Penny, September 2 2021

For many new companies, selling direct to the customer is quite natural. However, if you run an established company, you might be asking yourself how difficult will it be to set up a direct to customer model. This is the fourth in a series of articles on D2C. In previous articles we’ve looked at the factors that make D2C possible, the non-cash be...

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Market Strategy

Is there a D2C Distribution Model in your Future?

Andrew Penny, July 6 2021

As we continue to work with more and more manufacturers coming into North America, we are seeing a sharp increase in the number of companies that are exploring a Direct-to-Customer (D2C) model. The advantages of this are many, including: In the manufacturing segment, markups are typically 100% on the wholesale cost before it goes to retail. Innova...

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