McCullough Industries – Kenton, OH: Donna Fay, Teia Fisher and Lance Harris

The process to manufacture hoppers at McCullough Industries includes painting the finished product. Every painter wears a respirator with a cartridge that lasts for 8 hours. With the addition of two more shifts, this equates to a lot of cartridges! Teia Fisher, Painter, told her supervisor, Lance Harris, about a 40-hour cartridge that was used …

The process to manufacture hoppers at McCullough Industries includes painting the finished product. Every painter wears a respirator with a cartridge that lasts for 8 hours. With the addition of two more shifts, this equates to a lot of cartridges! Teia Fisher, Painter, told her supervisor, Lance Harris, about a 40-hour cartridge that was used at her previous employer. Donna Fay, Painter, helped collect part data and information so Lance could find a manufacturer for a cartridge that would work with their existing respirators. The switch to a 40-hour cartridge reduced the cartridge change from once/shift to once/week for each respirator and reduced the monthly spend from $3,000/month to $1,050/month – that’s a savings of $25,000 annually!

Lesson Learned:

It’s a good idea to periodically review expenses and products/processes related to daily/weekly routines. Just because something is working, doesn’t mean there isn’t a better (or less expense) way to get the job done.