Marine Fabricator January/February 2020 - 19

the bid on the back and goes to finance.
The yellow copy is simply a placeholder
and stays in the employee's rack to let
everyone know what that person is
working on. And the blue copy is for the
fabricator to take to his or her station
to access work details and also use it to
record time and materials.
A work order's job isn't necessarily
over after the project is complete,
however. Production manager Jess
Flegel and shop manager Cat Sieh from
Oyster Creek Canvas Co., Bellingham,
Wash., advise using work orders to
record any difference in the number of
hours bid versus the number of hours
worked on each project. "Let's say you
bid 20 hours on a job and it came in at
30. I would make note of that on the
work order so when you have a similar
job, you can pull the work order to
see that you need to bid higher next
time around," Sieh says. "Tracking
time makes a big difference in efficient
bidding for future projects."
Keep inventory in
plain sight
If you can see something, it typically takes
less time to access. Fabricators agree that
keeping materials visible is a huge time
saver, which translates into a reduction in
non-chargeable hours. Allerton says that
in a small shop like his (roughly 1,500
square feet), making use of wall space is
an especially efficient solution. "We hang
a lot of our bindings, hook-and-loop and
tapes on the wall-and the wall is pretty
much filled up."
Flegel and Sieh agree and suggest that
simple solutions such as storing inventory on the wall can serve two purposes.
"We moved away from storing zippers
in the boxes they come in to hanging
them on pegboards," Flegel says. "Not
only are they easily accessible, but you
can easily see when you're running low."
When using visible containers, Patterson points out that they don't have to

be costly. "Our inventory is not hidden,"
he says. "For instance, we keep all our
fittings in visible containers. Early on we
had an employee who was a cook and
he kept his fittings in big plastic spice
jars from Costco. We've been doing that
ever since. As soon as an order of fittings
comes in, we dump them into the spice
jars and label them so the whole inventory is immediately visible."

Bow to Stern Upholstery and Repair's
three stationary sewing machines are
positioned around its primary worktable.
Commonly used tools and materials are
kept close at hand, while more rarely
used items are stored elsewhere.
Photo: Bow to Stern Upholstery.

Think outside the box with
storage solutions
Not everything can be visible, but
everything can have its place-and with
a little thought and creativity, storage can
be an important part of the efficiency
puzzle. "The main thing I stress when
it comes to this topic is to not just think
about two-dimensional space. You've
got to maximize 3D space," says Kyle
Van Damme, part owner of Marine
Tops Unlimited Inc., Omro, Wis. "Get
creative with the areas of your shop
above 8 feet and under tables. Pretend
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Marine Fabricator January/February 2020

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