BRIGHT CLIENT PIONEER EQUIPMENT , INC .
Innovation Amid Crisis
It ’ s a call that none of us want to receive : You ’ ve been in contact with someone who has tested positive for COVID-19 .
But Eddie and Steven Wengerd were on the receiving end of that very call in March 2020 after attending a trade show in North Carolina ; a fellow attendee of that trade show had tested positive , so the Wengerd brothers settled in for a 14- day self-quarantine .
Back in March , if you ’ ll recall , the nation was bracing for impact : we knew coronavirus was going to spread across the country , and we knew our medical system was at grave risk of being stretched past its capacity .
Using this self-quarantine time for good , Eddie , general manager of PIONEER Equipment , Inc ., was struck by the anticipated shortage of hospital beds and personal protective equipment .
“ Eddie started wondering , ‘ What could we be doing ? How can we help ?’ And that ’ s when he came up with the idea to shift our manufacturing from farm equipment to hospital beds ,” said Leon
Wengerd , Eddie ’ s brother and PIONEER ’ s CFO . “ Thanks to our strong teams in engineering , sales , marketing and production , the bed project went from concept to market in just two weeks .”
BACK TO THE BEGINNING
Wayne Wengerd grew up working on his father ’ s farm in Ohio ’ s Amish Country . It was there that he began building plows . In 1978 , he founded PIONEER Equipment , Inc . For more than 40 years , PIONEER has manufactured quality horse-drawn equipment and has been a leader in equipment innovation and safety for farmers and their horses , operating under the guiding principles of integrity , stewardship , humility , accountability , respect and excellence .
Today , PIONEER , an Amish family-owned company headquartered in Dalton , Ohio , has 50 employees , including Wayne and eight of his children .
“ As the business grew to what it is today , Rea & Associates urged us to implement Lean Six Sigma ,” said Leon . “ This was truly transformational and revolutionary for our company . As part of that Lean manufacturing practice , we would build our workstations specifically for the work at hand . So when we had a new need , we had to discard the old workstation and build a new one to meet that need .” That kind of waste is a no-no under Lean principles , so Leon and his team looked for a better way .
“ We wanted to find a workstation we could use in multiple ways , but there was nothing in the marketplace that could do that ,” said Leon . But accepting defeat isn ’ t the Pioneer way , so they created their own . “ Customers started asking us about these workstations , and asked if we could make some for them .”
And with that , in 2018 , Pioneer ’ s Industrial Workflow Solutions ( PioneerIWS ) was born . “ With PioneerIWS , we are meting a demand for quality products that can help businesses achieve their Lean goals ,” said Leon .
And , as it turns out , the PioneerIWS project proved to be a key ingredient in making the bed project possible .
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