National Cranberry Cooperative Case Essay Example
Introduction
Hugo Schaeffer, vice president of operations at receiving plant 1 (RP1), runs a large cranberry processing plant. He is faced with many issues; the industry is changing dramatically and Hugo needs to make some key changes in his plant to keep up with new trends. In order to do this, Hugo has asked us to examine the cranberry processing method at RP1. The following are our findings and recommendations to Hugo. Hugo has informed us of the following problems and asked us to identify any other problems we notice in the process:
• Trucks queue for far too long (several hours) because there are insufficient holding bins for them to empty their contents
• RP1 is spending a significant amount on overtime expenditures
• Color grading is inefficient, leading RP1 to pay premium prices on approximately 225,000 bbls of poorer color quality berries in the previous year
• Determining whether or not it is beneficial to have the berry processing start earlier
The Flow
To establish a better idea of where the plant was heading and the capacities of each job, a process flow diagram was required. The following process flow diagram shows each activity and its capacity: To better understand the process at RP1, we were invited to witness a peak day of harvest where 18,000 berries went through the plant. Starting from 7AM the plant uniformly receives deliveries of berries for 12 hours. The average truck carries either wet or dry berries. Of the berries received daily, 70% were wet harvested and 30% were dry harvested. In other words, each hour brings in 1050 bbls. of wet berries and 450 bbls. of dry berries. Since there is ample storage for dry berries and relatively lesser amount of dry berries being delivered, they are able to flow through the plant within one hour without accumulating. In fact, the berries would flow directly through the dry bins and there is no need to use these bins as storage at all if processing starts at 7am. The
Hugo Schaeffer, vice president of operations at receiving plant 1 (RP1), runs a large cranberry processing plant. He is faced with many issues; the industry is changing dramatically and Hugo needs to make some key changes in his plant to keep up with new trends. In order to do this, Hugo has asked us to examine the cranberry processing method at RP1. The following are our findings and recommendations to Hugo. Hugo has informed us of the following problems and asked us to identify any other problems we notice in the process:
• Trucks queue for far too long (several hours) because there are insufficient holding bins for them to empty their contents
• RP1 is spending a significant amount on overtime expenditures
• Color grading is inefficient, leading RP1 to pay premium prices on approximately 225,000 bbls of poorer color quality berries in the previous year
• Determining whether or not it is beneficial to have the berry processing start earlier
The Flow
To establish a better idea of where the plant was heading and the capacities of each job, a process flow diagram was required. The following process flow diagram shows each activity and its capacity: To better understand the process at RP1, we were invited to witness a peak day of harvest where 18,000 berries went through the plant. Starting from 7AM the plant uniformly receives deliveries of berries for 12 hours. The average truck carries either wet or dry berries. Of the berries received daily, 70% were wet harvested and 30% were dry harvested. In other words, each hour brings in 1050 bbls. of wet berries and 450 bbls. of dry berries. Since there is ample storage for dry berries and relatively lesser amount of dry berries being delivered, they are able to flow through the plant within one hour without accumulating. In fact, the berries would flow directly through the dry bins and there is no need to use these bins as storage at all if processing starts at 7am. The