Quaker Oats. Customer Success

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1 Customer Success Quaker Oats Quaker Oats relies on CHAMPS CMMS to help work orders, inventories, and other aspects of daily operations, resulting in less downtime, better efficiency, and improved worker performance

2 We run an operation that covers nearly 2 million square feet under roof with multiple shifts seven days a week. It is imperative that our maintenance system is able to capture, track and manage all activity that we perform to keep our mill running efficiently. Judy Mittan, Facilities Maintenance Planner and Supervisor For more than 100 years, Quaker Oats has been an icon in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. Encompassing more than 45 acres and 1.9 million square feet, the Cedar Rapids plant is the largest cereal mill in the world. Every day, more than 800 personnel across three shifts produce ready to eat oatmeal, grits, and syrup. The mill also makes grains that are supplied to sister Quaker Oats plants. Each day, Quaker relies on the maintenance crew to ensure that Quakers operations run smoothly, but as the company grows the existing maintenance program in place began to struggle in order to keep up with their demands. Quaker Oats in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, operates the largest cereal mill in the world with personnel producing ready-to-eat oatmeal, grits, and supplying grains to sister plants Industry Food Processing Challenges Maintaining a massive production facility with a manual system while managing growth opportunities Solution Implementation of CHAMPS CMMS/ EAM for maintenance and materials management with interface to accounts payable system Growth-Fueled Advances Maintaining the product and facility equipment for a plant of this magnitude was a formidable challenge as all aspects of the maintenance program were being handled manually. With the continued grow of the company, Quaker soon realized that it would be nearly impossible and cost prohibitive to continue manually managing the maintenance and materials processes. Quaker knew that change was required in order to properly manage growth while sustaining competitiveness and attention was directed at the mill level for tracking and managing materials related primarily to the storeroom. To address this situation, Quaker searched to find a system for the storeroom function and purchasing department. A team comprised mainly of information systems personnel chose CHAMPS Software as the solution for their needs. Eventually, Quaker expanded their use of the system by implementing the maintenance management functionality of CHAMPS. This included all work order and equipment management functionality. We had a system that was doing a great job of helping us manage our storeroom

3 and purchasing areas states Judy Mittan, Facilities Maintenance Planner for Quaker Oats. When we added the functionality for maintenance management, we were able to gain immediate control of cost information and other important data. Because Quaker has 160 craft with an average of 15 years with the company supporting 3 operational shifts, implementation was handled internally. This gave long-time employees the comfort of being involved in the migration process. This internal team was able to successfully interface CHAMPS with existing Quaker accounts payable systems to allow the seamless transfer of financial data between the maintenance and accounting departments. Comprehensive Maintenance The CHAMPS system has become an essential component within the maintenance department and materials areas of the mill, handling all aspects of work order management from start to finish. Approximately 200 work orders are generated each week varying from planned and preventative maintenance to emergency situations, with the majority of them being initiated directly from production personnel who enter work orders from terminals located near the production lines. As soon as they are entered, work orders become immediately available for maintenance planners and supervisors to review and schedule, allowing them to plan and allocate personnel and resource to each task with little to no delay. Materials are gathered and priorities are determined then personnel are dispatched to execute the work order. Once the jobs have been completed, workers then record the amount of time they spent on the work order so that they can be balanced against time cards as a means for time tracking and accountability. When the work orders are finished, planners then review and close the work order and after a set number of days have passed the completed work orders are logged in the history of the asset. The labor and material costs are then rolled up into the equipment associated with the work order. In cases where the work order is found to be preventative maintenance, detailed job plans are available outlining all of the steps needed and additional information can be added as an attachment. Critical plant production equipment including compressors, ovens, conveyors, elevators, blowers and motors are fully maintained within CHAMPS. All repairs on equipment are tracked within the system on a component level, allowing Quaker to manage repairs, costs history, and other related information for each individual component as well as the primary equipment asset. By capturing a complete history on all work orders, Quaker is able to track spending, material usage, personnel activities, and more all from a single application.

4 and schedulers and can keep costs minimized. Before implementing the maintenance management system, Quaker was challenged in being able to confidently gather maintenance data and other information for analysis. Now, through active logging and built-in reporting, the system is able to generate numerous data, cost, and performance reports for review. These include open work order reports showing what work needs to be performed, daily inventory reports summarizing storeroom transactions, equipment costs, and more. Over the years, Quaker has realized dramatic changes and improvements to the way they manage maintenance. Specifically, the area of planning and scheduling has become much more effective by using CHAMPS versus manual management. We now get better wrench time through more effective planning and schedule of jobs, states Mittan. The system enables us to immediately see what tools and parts are available for each work order. We can know the associated cost for the job, including labor, and we ve become better planners Materials Management Control Not only have benefits been realized in maintenance, but in materials management savings. The CHAMPS system has become a critical tool for managing more than 20,000 stock keeping units (SKUs). Each Quaker SKU is set up with a min/max level to control spares inventory levels. CHAMPS will automatically create a purchase request for these SKUs when the re-order level has been reached and then send the purchase request to a vendor. This enables Quaker storeroom personnel to fully manage costs and usage of spare parts required for maintenance jobs, eliminating the problems related to stock-outs and excessive inventory items. Functionally Rich The CHAMPS system has become an essential tool for managing maintenance for Quaker, with a recent upgrade bringing new functionality for work order management, preventative maintenance, equipment management, scheduling, materials management, and improved administrative functions. As a result, Quaker has bee able to streamline all of their activities for maintenance supervisors and planners while expediting their procurement process. We understand the value of having a reliable and functionally rich maintenance system, Mittan says. CHAMPS is fully integrated with our cost and financial systems and provides the solution we need for managing equipment data, preventative maintenance, project tracking, and

5 purchasing. We consider our relationship with CHAMPS personnel as a partnership and have every intention of growing with the system. with quality products that millions have relied on to start their day for over 100 years. CHAMPS will continue to play a key role in Quakers long-standing reputation of producing some of the worlds most popular brands and breakfast tables throughout America will continue to be filled About CHAMPS For more than four decades, CHAMPS Software, Inc. has been developing and delivering Computerized Maintenance Management System (CMMS) and Enterprise Asset Management (EAM) software solutions that enable enterprises of varying size, sophistication, and industry to optimize the life cycles of their capital assets. CHAMPS CMMS/EAM continuously improves operations by incorporating industry best practices with the flexibility inherent in component based web solutions. Regardless of organizational size or geographical layout, CHAMPS CMMS/EAM is purposely scalable to manage business processes for asset optimization across the enterprise. Efficient acquisition, maintenance, repairs, replacement or salvaging of these critical assets result in operational excellence, leading to decreased cost and increased profits. If you d like to learn how to get the most out of your assets, visit us on the web at www. champsinc.com