CaseStudy
Calder Works
Calder Works is an industrial components manufacturer supplying automotive and equipment makers across North America. Two plants, 480 people, and thirty years in business.
How Calder Works Cut Unit Costs 31% And Hit 96% On-Time Delivery
Calder Works was shipping more than ever, yet margins kept slipping and late orders were costing them customers. Leadership suspected the plants, but had no shared view of where time and money were actually going. Over ten months we mapped both plants end to end, costed every product line, and rebuilt the planning cycle around real demand. This case study covers what we found and what changed.
Project Details
Service
Operations Management
Industry
Manufacturing
Company Size
480 employees
Timeline
10-month engagement
The Business Problem
Rising costs and late orders with no clear cause
Two plants, one blind spot.
Volume had grown 25% in three years, but unit costs kept climbing and only 71% of orders shipped on time. Each plant reported its own numbers in its own format, so leadership was comparing figures that didn't match.
Planning was the deeper problem. Production schedules were built from forecasts rather than firm orders, so lines sat idle waiting for parts while warehouses filled with stock nobody had asked for.
The Strategic Response
Shared production plan tied to real cost per unit
Walk the floor
Mapped every step from raw material to dispatch.
Cost every line
Found true cost per unit for each product line.
Fix the bottlenecks
Rebalanced shifts around the two slowest lines.
Plan to demand
Set one weekly plan from firm customer orders.
Lock in the gains
Review cost and delivery weekly with plant leads.
The Business Impact
Measured over the first 90 days after launch
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