Company getting lean

One local company is bringing a bit of the Far East to northwestern Odessa.

Mike Smith said he learned about the lean manufacturing model while working for previous companies. The program is taken from the Toyota manufacturing system and emphasizes creating value with less work.

Now he’s bringing it to Miether Bearing Products Inc.

"The companies are more profitable, because you have less overtime to do the same amount of work," said Smith, who is also the president of Miether Bearing Products.

Smith said the training has helped the company identify ways to save time. One thing he’s found is the importance of having workers spend less time lugging products back and forth around Miether’s four-football field long shop. Over the course of a year, the training can save 2.3 miles of movement on one piece of equipment.

In the past, Miether, which makes bearing housings for the mining, scrap yard, bridge building and steel industries, has stored all the large shells used for the housings in a storage area on the eastern end of the building. Keith Bartley, Miether engineering manager, said this meant bringing the shells back to the storage area after each time it was worked on in the shop. But to save time, lean training has showed the company to place the shells in smaller storage areas located throughout the 45,000 square foot building.

The company is also looking to reduce its inventory, which lean training advises, Bartley said.

"Lean tells you that inventory is bad," he said. "The quicker you can get this thing out the door and to the customer, the better."

Bartley said lean manufacturing could help Miether against larger competitors.

"We compete with a lot of big guys," he said. ""To have an edge on them, we try to beat them in delivery."

Miether is the first company to take advantage of the Odessa Development Corp.’s worker training program. Smith said ODC, which is funded by a quarter-cent sales tax, will pay for half of the $49,000 it will cost to train 26 workers.

ODC set aside $50,000 to go toward worker training in November, after initially considering awarding $100,000. But Arleene Loyd, the Odessa Chamber of Commerce’s director of business retention and expansion, said that she learned after ODC voted that money awarded from 4A economic development sales tax has to go toward some type of job creation.

"When I proposed that to the (ODC) board, I didn’t realize I had to tie that to jobs," Loyd said. "I considered it retention money."

Miether fit the bill because it plans to add two jobs to go along with the 24 current employees that will also undergo lean training. One is a current engineering student at the University of Texas of the Permian Basin, while Smith also plans to add a sales position.

Since then, the job creation stipulation, which doesn’t say how many jobs need to be brought in, has kept other companies from taking part in the program, Loyd said.

The training was intended to help companies have better skilled workers for when the economy picks up, Loyd said. But now, companies are starting to hire even without using the training.

Last month, Odessa added 300 jobs, with 200 in mining, logging and construction, which includes oil and gas jobs, according to the Texas Workforce Commission.

Despite the cost of the training, Smith said Miether could be saving money within the first year. The company has already identified $83,000 in annual savings as a result of lean manufacturing.

Miether has kaizen events scheduled in the coming weeks. The training, which is part of the lean process, brings about 10 workers at a time together to help identify ways to eliminate waste.

"We’ve just started," Bartley said. "I’m sure there’s going to be a lot more to figure out."

>> For information on taking part in the Odessa Development Corp.’s worker training program, call Arleene Loyd at 333-7886.