Manufacturing & Warehouse Distribution equipment, service, rentals & support from Abel Womack, Raymond forklift NE Distributor

Skip to content
  • Online Catalogs
  • Contact
  • Locations
  • Customer Login
  • Cleanrooms & Controlled Environments
  • FANUC Industrial Robots
  • Automated Storage and Retrieval Warehouse Systems
  • Manufacturing Solutions
  • Modular Building Systems
  • Raymond Forklifts
  • Mobile Storage Systems
  • About Us
    • Careers
    • Customer Service Policy
    • Customer Testimonials
    • Discover the Difference
    • Our Locations
    • Management Staff
    • Raymond Solutions & Support Center
  • Forklifts
    • Used Forklifts and Equipment
    • Forklift Rentals and Leases
    • J1-TSV Task Support Vehicle
    • Raymond Basics
    • Power Solutions
  • Parts & Service
    • Equipment Maintenance & Repair
    • Forklift & Conveyor Parts
    • Forklift Safety Training
    • Shop Warehouse Products
    • Tennant Sweepers and Tennant Scrubbers
  • Optimization
    • Fleet and Warehouse Management Solutions
    • Lean Management
    • Labor Management
    • Asset & Maintenance Management
    • Operator Assist Technologies
    • Real Time Location System
  • Robotics
    • Industrial Robots
    • ROBOXX
    • FANUC Robot M-20iA
    • FANUC Robot M-710iC
    • FANUC Robot M-410iB
  • Integrated Systems Solutions
    • Automated Guided Vehicles (AGV)
    • Automated Storage & Retrieval Systems
    • Conveyor Systems and Sortation
    • Deep Lane High Density Pallet Storage
    • Pallet Racking and Shelving
    • Mobile Storage Systems
    • Warehouse Automation and Software
    • Indoor Vertical Growing
    • Modular Building Systems
    • Cleanrooms and Controlled Environments
  • Engineering
    • Automated and Robotic Simulation
    • Facility Design and Layout
    • Project Management
  • Information
    • Blog
    • Case Studies
    • Industry Solutions
    • Videos
    • Media Kit
You are here: Home / News / Warehouse News / Lean manufacturing thrives amid coronavirus crisis

Lean manufacturing thrives amid coronavirus crisis

Lean manufacturing thrives amid coronavirus crisis

View original at www.thefabricator.com

A lean cell is configured to produce a field hospital cot about every 30 seconds. PioneerIWS workstations give assemblers quick access to tools and components. Being in quarantine, Eddie Wengerd had time on his hands. He had returned from the MODEX material handling tradeshow in Atlanta and was notified that someone at the event had tested positive for COVID-19. Eddie is general manager of Dalton, Ohio-based Pioneer, an Amish company that specializes in a small niche in the ag market that the plain community knows better than anyone: horse-drawn farm equipment. Powered off the grid by a natural gas generator, the operation has all the technology of a modern fab shop. The organization also has embraced lean manufacturing and has even designed flexible workstations that it now sells under the Gridlok and Flexturs brands through its subsidiary, Pioneer Industrial Workflow Solutions. When Eddie and his brother Steven, director of sales, returned from the tradeshow and learned they were exposed to COVDI-10, the two quarantined themselves for 14 days, but they spent that time wisely. One day Eddie showed his brother a newspaper article about how the country was running out of hospital beds, and the need for field hospital cots was exploding . “That’s when his mind started spinning.” So said Leon Wengerd, Pioneer’s CFO, who explained that at the tradeshow both Eddie and Steven met someone from the Lyon Group in Chicago who had connections throughout the medical supply chain. All the pieces of the puzzle—sales and distribution, local manufacturing collaborators, and lean production—seemed to be in place. Could it work? The world needs more field hospital cots now amid the coronavirus pandemic. Could Pioneer and its partners provide them? As Leon recounted, “Within a few days we developed a prototype in SolidWorks. The next day we had […]

About the Author

Sue Boczenowski is the Marketing Manager for Abel Womack.

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

You must be logged in to post a comment.

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

  • About Us
  • Industry Solutions
  • Blog
  • Products
  • Corporate News
  • Forklift News
  • Warehouse News
  • Contact
  • Twitter
  • Facebook
  • YouTube
  • Linkedin
Raymond_ASASC_2020

Abel Womack - Discover the Difference - logo
1 International Way
Lawrence, MA 01843
800-554-2887

  • Twitter
  • Facebook
  • YouTube
  • Linkedin
  • Home
  • About Us
  • Forklifts
  • Careers
  • Fleet Management Solutions
  • Professional Design & Engineering Services
  • Parts
  • Service
  • Forklift Training
  • Pre-Owned Forklifts
  • Forklift Rentals
  • Products
  • Contact Us
  • Sitemap
  • Privacy Policy
Offices In
Massachusetts
Connecticut
New York
Maine
New Hampshire
Rhode Island
Vermont

Copyright © 2023 · Abel Womack 2.0 on WordPress · Log in