Arnold Wills visit Acres for 5S Inspiration

For over three-quarters of a century, Arnold Wills has stood as a beacon of premier English leather craftsmanship, celebrated for its exceptional skill and timeless designs. Operating from their base in Uppingham, Rutland, they produce premium leather goods and high-end fashion accessories.

With the business flourishing, Arnold Wills has expanded its manufacturing capabilities and embraced cutting-edge technologies and methods to enhance its processes.

Embarking on a path of continuous improvement, the company has adopted principles like 5S and lean manufacturing, actively exploring effective production management strategies used by other leading manufacturers.

During a visit to Acres, Arnold Wills’ representatives were treated to a detailed tour and showcase of Acres’ successful integration of lean manufacturing and ongoing enhancement strategies in their operations.

Philippa Wills, the Managing Director at Arnold Wills, found the presentation of Acres Production’s ‘War Room’ particularly enlightening, appreciating the sophisticated control over production and the innovative features of the workshop environment’s touchscreens. Inspired, Philippa and her team, drawn from various sectors of the company, left with new ideas for operational improvements they could adopt.

Luke Parker of Acres Engineering, who conducted the tour, looks forward to potential collaboration with Arnold Wills, aiming to supply them with production and manufacturing equipment. Acres is known for its products that bolster efficiency, safety, and quality, including but not limited to stillages, kitting media, assembly benches, lifting gear, and access platforms.

Lean manufacturing is a systematic method for waste minimisation within a manufacturing system without sacrificing productivity. It can also be applied to other business processes. The central tenets of lean manufacturing include:

1. Value: Understanding what value the customer places upon products and services, focusing the organisation’s key processes to continually increase it. The ultimate goal is to provide the utmost value to the customer through a perfect value creation process that has zero waste.
2. Value Stream: The value stream is the series of steps that occur to provide the product or service to the customer, from raw material through to the finished product. Identifying and eliminating waste along this stream is a primary goal, improving quality and the time taken to deliver the product.
3. Flow: After waste is removed from the value stream, the next steps are to ensure that the flow of the remaining steps run smoothly without interruptions, delays, or bottlenecks.
4. Pull: Instead of producing as much as possible, production is based on customer demand. In a pull system, production is initiated by demand, reducing inventory levels and leading to more flexible production schedules.
5. Perfection: Lean manufacturing involves continuous improvement. The objective is to keep optimisng and eliminating waste to improve quality and efficiency, striving for perfection in the production process.

Lean principles not only help reduce costs and improve quality but also aim to increase productivity, flexibility, and customer responsiveness. Originally developed by Toyota in the automotive industry, these principles have been widely adopted across various sectors globally.

If you are just starting on your Lean manufacturing journey, or are well established in your Continual Improvement journey Acres can assist. Acres specialise in working with all varieties of Manufacturing businesses to assist them with improving their manufacturing processes. Talk to us today about your requirements: [email protected] / 01332695240 / Contact Us Form

Acres have a range of standard products but also support clients with custom machinery and medium-high volume products such as trolleys, stillages etc. 

We also manufacture custom products such as: access platforms, jigs and fixtures and many other types of production support solutions / products. 

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