Hebeler Corporation

Hebeler Corporation – a designer and fabricator of custom pressure vessels, heat exchangers and piping systems with facilities in Western New York and Ontario, Canada – requires continual focus on quality and cost effectiveness to remain competitive. TCIE first assisted Hebeler in 2002 by supporting ISO 9001:2000 certification and has continued to help the company in its quest to employ state-of-the art cost reduction, waste elimination, material movement and product quality methods.

Solutions:

Extensively trained 20 employees in Lean tools, including 5S, Value Stream Mapping, Pull/Kanban, Operations Balancing, Set-up Reduction and Cellular Flow
Trained a select number of role-based employees in the DMAIC methodology, including: one Green Belt, five Black Belts and one Master Black Belt
Supported continuous improvement efforts with four student Black Belt candidates over four years
Implemented methods to produce a corporate culture that values problem-solving and new approaches to challenges

Results:

Quadrupled annual revenues from $20 million in 1998 to $80 million by 2009, in part due to a new culture, deployment of a structured method, and management’s adoption of these same practices
Saved $280,000 annually by reducing direct labor requirements by several thousand hours
Saved $30,000 by uncovering a misplaced container of parts
Cut costs by an estimated $150,000 annually after lowering in-bound freight costs by sharply reducing the number of carriers