One in a Million
By Andrea Foote
Friday, August 15 2003
Friday, August 15 2003
Published on AllBusiness.com
Plenty of people have millions on their mind when they head to Las Vegas. The same is true when you head to neighboring Henderson, NV, where one million became a magic number for the folks at an Ocean Spray plant last February.
No, this isn't the tale of a workplace lottery windfall or a lucky day at the slots—at Ocean Spray Henderson one million represents an accomplishment that has nothing to do with luck and everything to do with hard work and dedication. The people here are smiling because they reached a remarkable milestone: one million operating hours without a lost-time accident.
In the world of beverage plants, this milestone is virtually unheard of. It represents the equivalent of 25,000 40-hour work weeks and is the result of 2.5 years of concerted effort by the 170-plus employees that are based at Henderson.
"This is an accomplishment that very few in our industry ever achieve," says Mike Stamatakos, vice president of operations for Ocean Spray. "I could not be more proud and more thrilled. A plant's safety record is a reflection of how well it is run. This milestone is an indication that Henderson does most—if not everything—well."
In fact, the folks at Ocean Spray headquarters were so thrilled with Henderson's milestone achievement that in early April CEO Randy Papadellis and Stamatakos hand-delivered on a promise to bring a good ole New England (Ocean Spray is headquartered in Lakeville-Middleboro, MA) clam bake to the desert in order to celebrate the achievement.
The clambake was held over two evenings to accommodate workers from all four shifts at the plant. And, to top it off, Hon. Jon C. Porter of Nevada's House of Representatives was on hand to offer a "Tribute to the workers at the Ocean Spray Nevada Plant," which he later entered into the congressional record.
Reaching the milestone has meant more than a clam bake and a congressional tribute to the folks at Ocean Spray Henderson. Paul Altimier, plant manager for the facility, says that One Million Hours has had a huge impact on the plant—in both financially measurable and less tangible but perhaps even more important—ways.
"The greatest thing that we see in terms of bottom-line numbers is a reduction in workman's comp premiums," says Altimier. "And that has started to generate the payback that we knew we would see in terms of costs per case and in the context of a world-class safety environment. Just as important to us, though, is what you might call the 'softer impacts.' The biggest is employee morale. People feel good about where they work. They are working in a safe place."
The milestone, according to Altimier also has had an impact on Henderson's co-packing business. The plant currently packages single-serve Gatorade and multiserve Nestle juice and nectar products along with Ocean Spray, but has capacity available for further co-packing projects. "Being viewed in the industry as a world-class manufacturer with very real cost and time efficiencies to offer is very important for us," he says.
THE ROAD TO SAFETY
The fact that Ocean Spray Henderson is one of the safest beverage plants around is no accident. The plant's impressive operations milestone is the result of a two-and-a-half-year effort to improve safety awareness, uptime and overall operations.
When the plant was built in 1994—to serve Ocean Spray customers west of the Rockies—Ocean Spray had a vision to create what Stamatakos refers to as a "high-performance work system." The goal, says Stamatakos, was to have an educated and involved workforce that would raise the bar in terms of plant performance and operations.
The work that Ocean Spray put into hiring and developing a team approach for its workforce had a positive impact—the plant was named Southern Nevada Distinguished Business of the Year in 1999—but there was still a way to go. Henderson still had an average safety record with the same sorts of strains, slips and mishaps that plague any beverage processing operations.
"Juice is not worth getting hurt over," says Stamatakos. "We wanted to do everything we could to give our employees the safest, healthiest working environment possible." To that end in 2001 Altimier and his fellow managers began a dedicated environmental, health and safety (EHS) program designed to transform Henderson into "a world-class safety environment."
An early step in the process was bringing in an occupational therapist to perform a job safety analysis on the plant. This helped Ocean Spray identify risks for repetitive stress injury and to develop proper employee training to avoid possible job hazards.
Plant management, lead by Altimier, technical services manager Greg Estermyer and EHS resource specialist Jim Colmey, developed a program to make safety awareness second nature at Henderson. The EHS program ranged from formal computer-based training—required of every employee—to fun promotions designed to get employees engaged with the safety message.
A big part of the safety culture that Altimier and Colmey are cultivating at Henderson is reflected in the plant's Safety Saturdays, which focus on a different safety or training area each week. "Topics vary from hands-on personal protection equipment training, lock out, tag out training or hazardous communications training to a review of employee progress on their computer-based training," says Colmey. "It's a little bit of a more formal way for us to keep employees informed."
Unique safety promotions also have been a part of Ocean Spray Henderson's safety focus. Walk the floor of the Henderson plant on any given day and you will see plenty of evidence—an Ocean Spray T-Shirt that declares, "Stay alert. Don't get hurt" or a watch that reminds its owner to "Take the time to do your job safely." The messages and the methods are simple, but according to Colmey, impactful.
Last June—well on its way to the 1,000,000-hour mark—plant management decided to run a promotion to increase safety awareness over the summertime. They called the program "Spotlight on Safety" and used give-aways of miniature spotlights to reinforce the message. The result, says Colmey, was an accident-free summer.
"It is really just phenomenal for this industry," says Colmey. "We have 180 employees that work 44 hours a week, so that's quite an accomplishment."
Reaching the One Million Hour Milestone was a 2.5-year journey that Colmey says has been a real team effort. "It's not just a case of the people in the front office talking the talk. It is the people on the floor and everyone in the facility walking the walk."
The Ocean Spray Henderson plant staff is divided into four teams and each is measured on just how well it walks the walk. Jim Colmey maintains a bulletin board that posts each team's days without a recordable accident. In mid-June while the plant as a whole had reached 1,209 days, Team C was setting the standard with just over four years without a recordable accident.
Making sure that everyone at Henderson is aware of the plant's progress has been a major focus for both Colmey and Altimier. A real-time scoreboard on the plant floor provides workers with a streaming update of the vital stats of the plant—monthly average costs per case, case volume and uptime are reported for both filling lines along with YTD stats. The idea, says Altimier, is that an informed worker is a stronger team member. "We operate in real time and we need real-time information to be able to know what we have achieved and what we are working towards."
THE OPERATION
Ocean Spray's safety record is all the more impressive when you consider the complexity of the operation. The hot-fill facility packs single-serve and multiserve PET packs ranging from 10-ounces to 1 gallon and a range of products from Ocean Spray's Cranberry Juice Cocktail to Gatorade and Nestle's Libby's and Kern's nectars. Two lines—one for single-serve that runs both Ocean Spray and Gatorade and one for multiserve, which runs Ocean Spray and the Nestle products—give the plant a capacity of about 22 million cases annually.
Safety and security around the Henderson plant extends beyond behavior on the plant floor. Even before the events of September 11 and the increased safety concerns and FDA regulations that followed, Ocean Spray Henderson had taken steps to maintain the integrity of its facility. The 40-acre site is monitored by multiple cameras, which record to high-definition video. The gates have been outfitted with keypad entry—regular delivery drivers are provided with updated codes on a regular basis and one-time deliveries must check in before entering the grounds.
Inside the plant, product quality and plant safety are paramount. The quality focus starts with the plant's reverse osmosis system, which processes all incoming water. The system, says Altimier, was deemed necessary because the water supplied to the plant from the Lake Mead aquifer is high in solids and not up to the quality standards that Ocean Spray requires for processing. The up-side to having the system on site says Altimier, is the presence of mind that comes with having 100-percent pure water at all times—and also the possibility that the plant would be able to co-pack bottled water now that R-O has become the accepted system for purifying bottled waters.
The safety focus also is apparent in the processing area where, Colmey notes, new non-skid, high-traction flooring has significantly increased safety. "Some of the most common accidents in a wet plant environment are strains and slips," says Colmey. "We made the switch to this flooring and to diamond plate flooring on the blend deck to reduce the chances of slips and falls."
A new state-of-the-art blend deck—which looks something like the flight deck of the Starship Enterprise—offers operators a fully automated system to monitor the blending process from recipes to CIP to water levels. Batching changeovers can range from once a day—when the facility runs 24-hours of Cranberry Juice Cocktail, for example—to up to 16 a day.
Product and package proliferation has affected Ocean Spray no less than the rest of the industry and as a result the Henderson plant has had to become flexible enough to handle product changeovers and a range of packages. Flexible packaging and handling equipment from KHS filling lines to Hartness accumulators allow the lines to accommodate package changeovers with minimal effort.
The multiserve line, on which Henderson runs everything from a rectangular 64-ounce bottle to a gallon container with a built-in handle, is especially versatile. "Ocean Spray needed to find a way to fit a square peg in a round hole. We were successful in introducing an innovative package design and finding a way to make it work on our existing lines," explains Altimier of the rectangular 64-ounce bottle that runs smoothly on a line that once handled only round beverage packages. And, says Altimier, the new Canmatic labeler from Krones applies the package's relatively complicated wrap-around and pressure-sensitive label combination without slowing down the line.
As with most beverage production plants, space is at a premium at Henderson. The plant operates on a JIT delivery and shipment schedule that helps to keep things running on time and within budget.
THE NEXT MILESTONE
Moving away from February's one million-hour mark means that Ocean Spray Henderson is moving toward its next milestone—two million hours. A bulletin board outside of Jim Colmey's office helps employees visualize their progress with a map of the world charting the course of an Ocean Spray hot-air balloon. The bulletin board even chronicles Jim Colmey's imaginary trip as the imaginary balloon heads "Around the world in two million hours"—by mid June he was dancing in Mongolia.
According to Altimier, the plant will celebrate its progress in 250,000-hour increments, and they are on track for a new celebration sometime early this fall. Altimier and his team are confident that two million hours is within reach.
"In my 23 years of experience in manufacturing, I have never seen the level of compassion, the strong work ethic and the dedication to the health and safety of each other that I have seen here at Henderson," Altimier says, convinced that the team of Henderson has what it takes.
Estermyer likens it to the "Tipping Point" phenomenon. "As managers, we helped to facilitate the safety program, but it is the people on the floor that made it happen. Now that we've reached the milestone, it's become a part of the way we operate," he says. "We have reached the point where awareness and safety is just a part of what we do here." BW
No, this isn't the tale of a workplace lottery windfall or a lucky day at the slots—at Ocean Spray Henderson one million represents an accomplishment that has nothing to do with luck and everything to do with hard work and dedication. The people here are smiling because they reached a remarkable milestone: one million operating hours without a lost-time accident.
In the world of beverage plants, this milestone is virtually unheard of. It represents the equivalent of 25,000 40-hour work weeks and is the result of 2.5 years of concerted effort by the 170-plus employees that are based at Henderson.
"This is an accomplishment that very few in our industry ever achieve," says Mike Stamatakos, vice president of operations for Ocean Spray. "I could not be more proud and more thrilled. A plant's safety record is a reflection of how well it is run. This milestone is an indication that Henderson does most—if not everything—well."
In fact, the folks at Ocean Spray headquarters were so thrilled with Henderson's milestone achievement that in early April CEO Randy Papadellis and Stamatakos hand-delivered on a promise to bring a good ole New England (Ocean Spray is headquartered in Lakeville-Middleboro, MA) clam bake to the desert in order to celebrate the achievement.
The clambake was held over two evenings to accommodate workers from all four shifts at the plant. And, to top it off, Hon. Jon C. Porter of Nevada's House of Representatives was on hand to offer a "Tribute to the workers at the Ocean Spray Nevada Plant," which he later entered into the congressional record.
Reaching the milestone has meant more than a clam bake and a congressional tribute to the folks at Ocean Spray Henderson. Paul Altimier, plant manager for the facility, says that One Million Hours has had a huge impact on the plant—in both financially measurable and less tangible but perhaps even more important—ways.
"The greatest thing that we see in terms of bottom-line numbers is a reduction in workman's comp premiums," says Altimier. "And that has started to generate the payback that we knew we would see in terms of costs per case and in the context of a world-class safety environment. Just as important to us, though, is what you might call the 'softer impacts.' The biggest is employee morale. People feel good about where they work. They are working in a safe place."
The milestone, according to Altimier also has had an impact on Henderson's co-packing business. The plant currently packages single-serve Gatorade and multiserve Nestle juice and nectar products along with Ocean Spray, but has capacity available for further co-packing projects. "Being viewed in the industry as a world-class manufacturer with very real cost and time efficiencies to offer is very important for us," he says.
THE ROAD TO SAFETY
The fact that Ocean Spray Henderson is one of the safest beverage plants around is no accident. The plant's impressive operations milestone is the result of a two-and-a-half-year effort to improve safety awareness, uptime and overall operations.
When the plant was built in 1994—to serve Ocean Spray customers west of the Rockies—Ocean Spray had a vision to create what Stamatakos refers to as a "high-performance work system." The goal, says Stamatakos, was to have an educated and involved workforce that would raise the bar in terms of plant performance and operations.
The work that Ocean Spray put into hiring and developing a team approach for its workforce had a positive impact—the plant was named Southern Nevada Distinguished Business of the Year in 1999—but there was still a way to go. Henderson still had an average safety record with the same sorts of strains, slips and mishaps that plague any beverage processing operations.
"Juice is not worth getting hurt over," says Stamatakos. "We wanted to do everything we could to give our employees the safest, healthiest working environment possible." To that end in 2001 Altimier and his fellow managers began a dedicated environmental, health and safety (EHS) program designed to transform Henderson into "a world-class safety environment."
An early step in the process was bringing in an occupational therapist to perform a job safety analysis on the plant. This helped Ocean Spray identify risks for repetitive stress injury and to develop proper employee training to avoid possible job hazards.
Plant management, lead by Altimier, technical services manager Greg Estermyer and EHS resource specialist Jim Colmey, developed a program to make safety awareness second nature at Henderson. The EHS program ranged from formal computer-based training—required of every employee—to fun promotions designed to get employees engaged with the safety message.
A big part of the safety culture that Altimier and Colmey are cultivating at Henderson is reflected in the plant's Safety Saturdays, which focus on a different safety or training area each week. "Topics vary from hands-on personal protection equipment training, lock out, tag out training or hazardous communications training to a review of employee progress on their computer-based training," says Colmey. "It's a little bit of a more formal way for us to keep employees informed."
Unique safety promotions also have been a part of Ocean Spray Henderson's safety focus. Walk the floor of the Henderson plant on any given day and you will see plenty of evidence—an Ocean Spray T-Shirt that declares, "Stay alert. Don't get hurt" or a watch that reminds its owner to "Take the time to do your job safely." The messages and the methods are simple, but according to Colmey, impactful.
Last June—well on its way to the 1,000,000-hour mark—plant management decided to run a promotion to increase safety awareness over the summertime. They called the program "Spotlight on Safety" and used give-aways of miniature spotlights to reinforce the message. The result, says Colmey, was an accident-free summer.
"It is really just phenomenal for this industry," says Colmey. "We have 180 employees that work 44 hours a week, so that's quite an accomplishment."
Reaching the One Million Hour Milestone was a 2.5-year journey that Colmey says has been a real team effort. "It's not just a case of the people in the front office talking the talk. It is the people on the floor and everyone in the facility walking the walk."
The Ocean Spray Henderson plant staff is divided into four teams and each is measured on just how well it walks the walk. Jim Colmey maintains a bulletin board that posts each team's days without a recordable accident. In mid-June while the plant as a whole had reached 1,209 days, Team C was setting the standard with just over four years without a recordable accident.
Making sure that everyone at Henderson is aware of the plant's progress has been a major focus for both Colmey and Altimier. A real-time scoreboard on the plant floor provides workers with a streaming update of the vital stats of the plant—monthly average costs per case, case volume and uptime are reported for both filling lines along with YTD stats. The idea, says Altimier, is that an informed worker is a stronger team member. "We operate in real time and we need real-time information to be able to know what we have achieved and what we are working towards."
THE OPERATION
Ocean Spray's safety record is all the more impressive when you consider the complexity of the operation. The hot-fill facility packs single-serve and multiserve PET packs ranging from 10-ounces to 1 gallon and a range of products from Ocean Spray's Cranberry Juice Cocktail to Gatorade and Nestle's Libby's and Kern's nectars. Two lines—one for single-serve that runs both Ocean Spray and Gatorade and one for multiserve, which runs Ocean Spray and the Nestle products—give the plant a capacity of about 22 million cases annually.
Safety and security around the Henderson plant extends beyond behavior on the plant floor. Even before the events of September 11 and the increased safety concerns and FDA regulations that followed, Ocean Spray Henderson had taken steps to maintain the integrity of its facility. The 40-acre site is monitored by multiple cameras, which record to high-definition video. The gates have been outfitted with keypad entry—regular delivery drivers are provided with updated codes on a regular basis and one-time deliveries must check in before entering the grounds.
Inside the plant, product quality and plant safety are paramount. The quality focus starts with the plant's reverse osmosis system, which processes all incoming water. The system, says Altimier, was deemed necessary because the water supplied to the plant from the Lake Mead aquifer is high in solids and not up to the quality standards that Ocean Spray requires for processing. The up-side to having the system on site says Altimier, is the presence of mind that comes with having 100-percent pure water at all times—and also the possibility that the plant would be able to co-pack bottled water now that R-O has become the accepted system for purifying bottled waters.
The safety focus also is apparent in the processing area where, Colmey notes, new non-skid, high-traction flooring has significantly increased safety. "Some of the most common accidents in a wet plant environment are strains and slips," says Colmey. "We made the switch to this flooring and to diamond plate flooring on the blend deck to reduce the chances of slips and falls."
A new state-of-the-art blend deck—which looks something like the flight deck of the Starship Enterprise—offers operators a fully automated system to monitor the blending process from recipes to CIP to water levels. Batching changeovers can range from once a day—when the facility runs 24-hours of Cranberry Juice Cocktail, for example—to up to 16 a day.
Product and package proliferation has affected Ocean Spray no less than the rest of the industry and as a result the Henderson plant has had to become flexible enough to handle product changeovers and a range of packages. Flexible packaging and handling equipment from KHS filling lines to Hartness accumulators allow the lines to accommodate package changeovers with minimal effort.
The multiserve line, on which Henderson runs everything from a rectangular 64-ounce bottle to a gallon container with a built-in handle, is especially versatile. "Ocean Spray needed to find a way to fit a square peg in a round hole. We were successful in introducing an innovative package design and finding a way to make it work on our existing lines," explains Altimier of the rectangular 64-ounce bottle that runs smoothly on a line that once handled only round beverage packages. And, says Altimier, the new Canmatic labeler from Krones applies the package's relatively complicated wrap-around and pressure-sensitive label combination without slowing down the line.
As with most beverage production plants, space is at a premium at Henderson. The plant operates on a JIT delivery and shipment schedule that helps to keep things running on time and within budget.
THE NEXT MILESTONE
Moving away from February's one million-hour mark means that Ocean Spray Henderson is moving toward its next milestone—two million hours. A bulletin board outside of Jim Colmey's office helps employees visualize their progress with a map of the world charting the course of an Ocean Spray hot-air balloon. The bulletin board even chronicles Jim Colmey's imaginary trip as the imaginary balloon heads "Around the world in two million hours"—by mid June he was dancing in Mongolia.
According to Altimier, the plant will celebrate its progress in 250,000-hour increments, and they are on track for a new celebration sometime early this fall. Altimier and his team are confident that two million hours is within reach.
"In my 23 years of experience in manufacturing, I have never seen the level of compassion, the strong work ethic and the dedication to the health and safety of each other that I have seen here at Henderson," Altimier says, convinced that the team of Henderson has what it takes.
Estermyer likens it to the "Tipping Point" phenomenon. "As managers, we helped to facilitate the safety program, but it is the people on the floor that made it happen. Now that we've reached the milestone, it's become a part of the way we operate," he says. "We have reached the point where awareness and safety is just a part of what we do here." BW
