Redefin­ing Suc­cess in Plas­tic Film Man­u­fac­tur­ing: A Strate­gic Approach to Achiev­ing Com­pet­i­tive Advantage

BACKGROUND

Com­mit­ment to inno­va­tion and effi­cien­cy dri­ve suc­cess in the plas­tic film man­u­fac­tur­ing indus­try. The indus­try is con­stant­ly evolv­ing in devel­op­ing ground-breaking plas­tic film prod­ucts to meet cus­tomer needs. Inno­va­tions in bar­ri­er prop­er­ties, dura­bil­i­ty, flex­i­bil­i­ty, and sus­tain­abil­i­ty, prod­ucts are at the fore­front of mar­ket trends. Man­u­fac­tur­ing effi­cien­cy is dri­ven through invest­ments in mod­ern tech­nolo­gies, automa­tion, process opti­miza­tion, and sup­ply chain management.

Over 25 years ago, our Client intro­duced wide width plas­tic sheet­ing to con­trol damp and water pen­e­tra­tion into build­ings. Over the years it expand­ed man­u­fac­tur­ing capac­i­ty and is today one of the largest flex­i­ble plas­tic film man­u­fac­tur­ers in the South­ern Hemi­sphere man­u­fac­tur­ing a large range of both print­ed and plain pack­ag­ing mate­ri­als for a wide range of appli­ca­tions in agri­cul­tur­al, build­ing and FMCG sectors.

THE CHALLENGE

The Client asked Renoir to col­lab­o­rate and con­duct an analy­sis at the pro­duc­tion plant to increase com­pet­i­tive­ness, aim­ing to improve pro­duc­tiv­i­ty lev­els, sales, OEE and cost structures.

ANALYSIS & PROJECT APPROACH

The main find­ings of the in-depth analy­sis were:

1. There was a need for a clear dis­tinc­tion between non-value-added time and pro­duc­tive value-added time.
2. The cur­rent mod­el did not facil­i­tate active super­vi­sion, plan­ning, report­ing, review­ing, and mak­ing cor­rec­tive action through dai­ly review meetings.
3. Process­es were weak and turn­around times were too slow.
4. There was a wide vari­a­tion in Stan­dards of ser­vice levels.

As a result of these find­ings, the Client com­menced a 28-week project in part­ner­ship with Renoir with the fol­low­ing objectives:

1. Imple­ment Account Man­age­ment sys­tems and practices
2. Define a man­u­fac­tur­ing mod­el for opti­mum cost-revenues levels.
3. Gen­er­ate more avail­able time and increase the effec­tive­ness of time.
4. Achieve behav­iour­al changes to ensure full adop­tion and thus sus­tain­abil­i­ty of the new sys­tems and processes.

The ini­tial 4‑week Renoir Focus Process® phase focused on the iden­ti­fi­ca­tion and qual­i­fi­ca­tion of oppor­tu­ni­ties in var­i­ous areas of the busi­ness, includ­ing Sales & new Prod­uct Devel­op­ment, Pro­duc­tion Plan­ning, Raw Mate­ri­als and Cores, Main­te­nance, Pro­duc­tion (Mix­ing, Extru­sion, Bag Mak­ing, Print­ing and Fin­ish­ing) and Fin­ish Goods and Dispatch.

IMPLEMENTATION

The Project’s main impact was the cre­ation of a team ded­i­cat­ed to focus on the above. Job descrip­tions were enhanced, enabling the Head of Depart­ments to man­age more effec­tive­ly the day-to-day activ­i­ties. A new span of con­trol pol­i­cy was also imple­ment­ed. One of the tools intro­duced was the Pro­duc­tion Plan which enable the com­pa­ny to ‘freeze’ the plan for 12 days.

Oper­a­tional Dash­boards were also enhanced, allow­ing all HODs to keep track of their per­for­mance. Of key impor­tance was that the changes made would be sus­tain­able. Sys­tem­at­ic audits and checks were devel­oped to allow for guid­ance and coach­ing, ensured that the new struc­ture and new ways of work­ing were under­stood and ful­ly adopt­ed and new KPIs were met.

The imple­men­ta­tion com­plete­ly changed com­pa­ny oper­a­tions. The new KPIs now sup­port­ed the desired out­comes. New rel­e­vant report­ing, dai­ly stand-up meet­ings and dash­boards allowed HODs to have increased vis­i­bil­i­ty in real time, includ­ing bet­ter insights into root causes. 

“These results were beyond expec­ta­tions, espe­cial­ly in light of the age of the equipment”

Tech­ni­cal Manager

KEY RESULTS