INDUSTRYNEWS
Doing More
with Less –
The Legacy of
Lockdown
By Martin Nettleton, Managing
Director, Euroglaze
» LIKE MOST PVC-U
fabricators, we returned to work
post-lockdown with a reduced
workforce. Cautious about
how demand would recover
and constrained by the new
social distancing requirements,
we initially brought only 50%
of our production team back
from furlough. Within a few
weeks though, that 50% was
manufacturing 80% of our usual
output; and we’re definitely
not the only manufacturer to
experience that.
Euroglaze was already a highly
efficient business, built on the
principles of lean manufacturing,
and we were confident that
we were probably amongst the
market leaders in terms of output
per fabricator. However, what we
learnt in those weeks during and
immediately after lockdown, when
we had to reorganise our factory
and strip back every process to
minimise contact, was that we
were all actually capable of even
more.
The kneejerk response might
have been to gradually build the
team back up to the optimal level
and restore our previous position.
However, with demand booming
and even more opportunities
possibly coming as a result of
the government’s green grant
announcements, our plan at
Euroglaze is actually to introduce
a second shift for the remaining
50% of our team and potentially
increase our output to 160% of
pre-lockdown levels.
It’s obviously not that simple a
calculation, but we will certainly
be able to deliver the increases
in volume which we will need to
keep pace with our customers,
without sacrificing the efficiencies
we have already achieved; and
if that is one of the legacies of
lockdown, then it’s a remarkable
one.
Post lockdown of course,
business is no less competitive
than it ever was, and it will be the
businesses which are the most
efficient which I think will emerge
from this crisis as the winners.
As we’ve seen from some of the
high-profile casualties during
this period, it is no good being
competitive on price if that comes
at the expense of your overall
profitability and leaves you with
nothing left to invest in customer
service.
As I see it, the only way to stay
both competitive and profitable is
to focus relentlessly on your own
efficiency. Only then can you really
add value to your customers’
businesses and demonstrate that
they don’t have to choose either
service or price. Pick the right
supplier and it is perfectly possible
to have both.
As well as production, the
lockdown has given Euroglaze the
opportunity to look for other
ways to do more with less. I’m
a great believer in the concept
of marginal gains and we’ve
focused particularly on customer
service and how we interact with
customers.
I know that our customer
service team are one of our
biggest assets and have great
relationships with our customers,
but equally I know that phoning
us to ask what time a delivery is
due or whether we have a specific
item in stock is a waste of time
and money for our customers.
That’s why we’re extending the
use of our bespoke DS system
which gives us full traceability of
every item in the factory and lets
our customers access much of
that data as well.
We already have Eurostock
which alerts a customer to an
item which is out of stock when
they place an order online or
on the phone, allowing them
to choose an alternative or
reschedule their workflows, and
we also have an alert which means
incomplete orders can’t be loaded
or unloaded from our vans.
But now we’re targeting the
kind of order tracking that we’ve
all got used to with our online
shopping during lockdown,
enabling customers to see exactly
where their order is from start to
finish and know the point up to
which they can potentially make
changes.
We’re incentivising Euroglaze
customers to use our Windows
on the Web online ordering tool
because we know it saves time for
them and for us and we’re already
working on a new delivery app.
Lockdown presented us all
with a unique opportunity to
re-examine our businesses and
work out ways to be even better.
We will probably never have that
chance again.
www.euroglaze.co.uk
20 » SEP 2020 » CLEARVIEW-UK.COM