Lean Trainings and Follow-on Kaizen Events Result in Big Savings for Amber Waves
Amber Waves
Established in 2002, Amber Waves, a family-owned manufacturer in Richardton, ND, engineers and constructs hopper bottom grain bins for customers in Western North Dakota. With extra heavy steel design and aeration systems that assist with dry-down of a crop, their customized bins are built to last.
Amber Waves is committed to being a premier provider of quality products based on customer satisfaction. To safely provide the highest quality, best-in-class storage solutions to our customers who grow and feed the world in the markets they serve.
Their story began in early 2001 when Ambrose Hoff and his son Jody, along with Gerald Hauck and his son Doug tinkered with the concept of manufacturing hopper bottom bins in the small rural community of Richardton, ND. The families have long roots in the area, operating family farms near Richardton for generations. After graduating with engineering degrees from NDSU in the early ‘90s and honing their design skills with other companies, Jody and Doug were eager to move back home and try their hands at entrepreneurship.
When a tenured manufacturing company closed its doors in town these forward-thinking gentlemen sprung in to action, acquiring property and buildings, and Amber Waves, Inc. was born. The company opened for business in January 2002 and in August the very first hopper bottom bin was manufactured, sold and delivered.
Today, with thousands of Amber Waves smooth wall bins in service across the USA, their talented staff can assist with every aspect of your project. From design and engineering through manufacturing and delivery, Amber Waves has the knowledge and experience to get it right the first time. Amber Waves, Inc. is proud to be producing in the USA and operates from a 60,000 square foot factory and company headquarters located in the heartland of America.
Amber Waves had previously worked with Impact Dakota, so when they started experiencing workforce issues, they remembered their previous partnership with Impact Dakota and contacted them to come onsite for a tour and follow up meeting. They were experiencing limited workforce in their area of North Dakota resulting in the need to do be creative with innovation to utilize people.
From the start they began engaging and investing in their workforce by attending Impact Dakota's Lean 101 training, Lean Enterprise High Performance Manufacturing (LEHPM) training, and holding Kaizen events. They also participated in a Business Excellence Assessment (BizX) in which they were provided an Implementation roadmap to engage their Strategy, Organizational Structure, Workforce, Lean Concepts, Communication and Metrics/Rewards. From the BizX Assessment they started to implement Huddle Boards on the shop floor to understand their Issues, Problems and Opportunities to engage their workforce in identifying items for improvement. During the kaizen events the employees trained were able to see the improvement process first hand, see their ideas at work and make their areas more productive and efficient.
Amber Waves trained 12 Employees to Lean 101 to be able to identify the Top 10 Wastes and understand Flow, and sent two employees onto the Five-Day LEHPM training to be Champions able to lead kaizen events. Amber Waves practiced this training by holding four Kaizens. Their first kaizen event was implementing two Huddle Boards to have employees contribute their ideas. They held one event in their Ladders Assembly Area rearranging the flow to a U-Shaped cell resulting in $2,000 in savings, next they held an E&O event in our Fabrication Saw Area resulting in $2,000 in savings. The third event was in their Assembly Area using 5S to efficiently arrange three tool carts and add an additional overhead door to realize flow and space resulting in $20,000 in savings.
“Lyle and Wendy came to Amber Waves with a great attitude, they listened to our concerns and lead two, two-day events with Mike and Erik as champions of the events. They did a great job helping us use the Lean tools to effect long term positive change, the event was well attended by AWI production workers whose ideas were promptly implemented. I would invite them back anytime.”
—Brent Swanson, Engineering Manager