Maximizing Throughput $$$ in Your Bakery
Last month, we talked about the concept of a "drum beat" that synchronizes all the activities in your bakery. In our example we focused on the ovens, assuming that they are the best choice of equipment to set the "beat" for a bakery. After all you can only produce in a day what you can bake so we are assuming that the baking rate of your ovens set the beat for your bakery.
This month we are going to discuss the principles of exploiting a production "drum". We will continue to use oven capacity as our drum and we will outline:
1. Methods that can be applied to keep your ovens baking at a steadier pace.
2. Methods that can be applied to maximize the throughput $$$ generated by the activities before and after baking.
The first principle of synchronization is to find a focal point, or set of activities, to be the focus for synchronization.
The second principle of synchronization is to exploit your focal point to its fullest. In our case the focal point is oven capacity. To exploit our oven capacity we have to ensure that the ovens are baking as much as possible. The time it takes to load and unload each oven must be as short as possible. The time it takes to change an oven over from one product to another must be as short as possible.
Nothing earth shattering here. In most of the bakeries we visit, we see good activity around the ovens. However there are also times where we see that oven down time could be reduced significantly. There are also times where we see that much more profit could be made on the products that get baked.
The problems we see fall into four categories:
1. Inconsistent depositing before baking
2. Slow unloading and reloading
3. Damaging or rejecting product after it is baked
4. Failure to add enough value to product after it is baked
Let's look at Slow Unloading and Reloading of Ovens.
Our recommendation to improve this situation is to have a "pit crew" mentality. Don't be concerned about going a little overboard here. Make sure you have enough of the right kind of pans and enough racks if you are using rack ovens. If you deposit product such as pumpkin pie slurry, or a water bath for cheese-cake, directly into your pans while they are in the oven or on your racks consider using an extra person. To speed up pumpkin slurry depositing there are solutions in the market that help control portioning and prevent overflow onto pie-crusts.
Determine the root cause of your loading and reloading problems. We have seen ovens sit empty because pans were not available for depositing. The pans were not available because de-panning was too slow. The de-panning was too slow because the baked cakes were being injected and this was holding up de-panning.
Our recommendation was to use more pans or more people de-panning or an injection system to speed up the process. When you run the numbers for your products you will quickly see how much more profit will be made by improving the percentage of bake time on your ovens.
Let's use an example — baking cheesecakes:
Our starting point is a production rate of 336 cheesecakes per 8 hour shift.
Our regular size cheesecakes sell for $5 and our ingredients cost plus packaging is $3.
Our throughput $$ on each cheese-cake are $5-$3= $2.
Baking capacity is 40 cheesecakes every half hour.
1 half hour of bake time = 40 x $2 = $80 in throughput.
Load time is 10 minutes / Unload time is 10 minutes.
The Cycle time to bake 40 cheesecakes is:
1. Bake time 30 minutes
2. Load time 10 minutes
3. Unload time 10 minutes
4. Total time = 50 minutes
Total break time per shift is 60 minutes.
For an 8 hour shift this leaves 7 hours or 420 minutes to bake cheesecakes.
In 7 hours our bakery will produce 420/50 x 40 = 336 cheesecakes.
At $2 of throughput per cheesecake the total throughput per shift is 336 x $2 = $672.
$672 for 5 days per week x 50 weeks per year = $168,000 of throughput per year.
Recommendation # 1
Take breaks during the bake time. This adds another 60 minutes to the shift. Shift can now produce for 420 + 60 = 480 minutes. Number of cheese cakes baked will increase to 480 / 50 x 40 = 384 cheesecakes per shift.
Recommendation # 2
Pull another person to the oven to help with unloading and loading. Say this reduces the loading time to 5 minutes and the unloading time to 5 minutes. The cycle time to produce 40 cheesecakes is now 30 minutes to bake, 5 minutes to load and 5 minutes to unload for a total of 40 minutes.
Combining the two recommendations the number of cheesecakes per shift will be:
Cheesecakes per shift 480 / 40 x 40 = 480.
Throughput $$ per day will be 480 x $2 = $960.
The throughput $$ per year will be:
$960 for 5 days per week x 50 weeks per year = $240,000 of TP per year. Acting on the two recommendations increases TP $$ by $72,000. This $72,000 should go straight to the bottom line. You should not have to add labor to improve on oven usage.
Here is our thinking:
In our example we started with having 2 people loading for 10 minutes, 10 times per shift, and two people unloading for 10 minutes 10 times per shift. We end up with 3 people loading for 5 minutes, 12 times per shift, and 3 people unloading for 5 minutes 12 times per shift. This pit crew approach should not require us to add staff. We should be able to find an extra person to help in the unloading and loading for the short 5 minute bursts 12 times throughout the shift.
The key is to realize that (in our example) the oven sets the money making beat for the bakery. Focusing on getting as much bake time as possible is the first step in generating more profit for your bakery.
Next month we talk about Inconsistent Depositing Before Baking.
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