Baking&Snack - February 2012 - 46

HOSTESS BRANDS

pies to cool before they enter the Delta horizontal form/fill/seal wrapper that packages pies individually.

Stoking the engine
Each production line at Emporia depends on equipment customized for Hostess’ use, and each benefits from changes made through 5S. The process starts with teamwork applied not only to individual

By pumping cake icing directly from the prep system to the depositor, the bakery eliminated the extra handling and manual labor of previous methods.
Blane Sutton

departments but also to the plant as a whole. 5S provides an easy-to-understand framework. “5S means Sort, Set in Order, Shine, Standardize and Sustain,” Mr. Crook said. “And, of course, put into action.” (See “Five S’s, plus a sixth” on Page 52.) “We presented 5S to the employees, and they took off with it,” he added. “Sort” eliminates clutter. If a piece of equipment or a tool hasn’t been used in a week, any employee can stick a red tag on it. The object is then moved out of the production plant and away from daily activities. “Early on, we red-tagged and took out a good five or six truckloads of extraneous stuff,” Mr. Wilson said. “Set in Order,” Mr. Peele explained, “basically means a place for everything and everything in its place. It’s a time management approach that makes sure tools and equipment are where they should be. Just the placement of a utensil at a different location can make the difference between one unit of waste versus 10 units.” The bakery established fixed spaces for every tool, utensil and moveable piece of equipment. In some

BRC protocols, too

Almost three years ago, Hostess Brands, Irving, TX, adopted British Retail Consortium (BRC) Global Standards for certification of food safety companywide. The Emporia, KS, cake bakery achieved an “A” rating in its latest inspection, its second under these protocols. “BRC affects the entire bakery, including how we track and document activities, said Plant Manager Todd Crook. ” Ongoing training is a BRC pillar, requiring annual updates for all staff with testing done throughout the year. “Every employee gets training, with leaders getting more, Mr. Crook said. The company takes a train” the-trainer approach, providing instruction first to supervisors, who then train their teams. “Also, under BRC, you have to verify that the training is done, ob” served Ron Wilson, field director, Hostess Brands. For more technical bakery-specific education, Hostess Brands sends staff to American Institute of Baking resident courses and seminars. It also offers its own classes in manufacturing, function of ingredients, control of downtime and so forth. Cake classes take place at the Emporia bakery in periodic 2-week sessions.

cases, yellow paint delineates the storage space; in others, the bakery installed hard yellow-colored pieces of plastic and numbered metal plates directly into the tile floor. Thus, operators always know where to find a given item. “Shine” stipulates that all staff members are tasked with cleaning their work areas when they finish their work and shifts. It also prioritizes waste management, preventing spillage, reducing cripples, cutting wastewater and recycling materials. “Standards” led to development of the “blue boards” found throughout the bakery. These display photos of acceptable and unacceptable products. They also show results, listed by department and for the plant as a whole. Mr. Wilson explained the guiding principles of the company’s business practices as “teamwork; be the best at what you do; question everything; creativity before capital; develop a knowledge base; and promote information sharing.” “Teamwork is essential, and we also keep score,” Mr. Crook said. “We want our employees to feel good about what they do, and thus, scoring has to be objective.” He meets every Tuesday morning with the bakery’s supervisors, reviewing the goals, standards and results for each department. Supervisors read their departments’ numbers in front of their peers. Results are also calculated as an overall number representing the plant as a whole. The numbers are posted in the conference room and throughout the bakery. This tactic fosters the sense of individual responsibility that is an essential component of 5S. “If someone misses his or her number, it’s our job as a group to focus the effort to hit the desired result,” Mr. Wilson explained. “It’s about the quality of the product, the quality of our work.”

/ Baking & Snack / February 2012

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Baking&Snack - February 2012

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