Impressions - September 2015 - 56

Embroidery Production

Trash Container

optional front window display

Computer

Goods

Four-Way
Waterfall
Display

Multi-Head Machine

Staging and storage area
Shipping/Receiving door

Break room
and
offices

Single
Head
Machine

Inspection/
Finishing Table
Work Table

In a team concept, the hooping table is
moved to a central location at the head of a U-shape
arrangement or incorporated into an L-shape.

Because defective items that have been
embroidered usually can't be returned,
don't bypass this step.
Place the inspected items in a staging
area. This is similar to a holding area,
where the goods "hang out" until all components are available, including thread,
digitizing, garments, stabilizer and any
other special items.
The staging area makes it easy to find a
contingent order if an existing one must be
pulled from a machine or gets cancelled.
Work orders should be displayed inside a
clear job jacket and travel with the goods
throughout production.

SCHEDULING
In the staging area, items awaiting embroidery are arranged according to the
schedule. For shops in which I managed
production, I designed a schedule planner.
All orders were entered in it, including time
estimates for each job. After assigning jobs
to specific machines, the production hours
easily could be totaled, revealing available
production time, or whether extra shifts or
overtime was needed.
56

Impressions | September 2015

K
E
Y

Counter

Stool
Utility
Cabinet

Fitting Room

I recommend building a buffer of about
20% into the actual schedule, allowing for
machine malfunction, employee absence
and other unexpected downtime. This
also ensures that the schedule can consistently be met or exceeded, which builds
team morale.
Anticipation is required to effectively
transition from one job to the next. Can
some thread colors be changed before the
end of the current job? It's not correct to
say that being efficient is more important
on a multihead machine than on a singlehead because the latter represents 100%
of your production. Still, there is a higher
cost and reward at stake with multihead
equipment, so anticipation pays off in
time savings at the setup stage.
The pre-production stitch out should
be alongside the order, proper hoops
should be pulled and the appropriate stabilizers should be cut. For multihead shops, I recommend keeping three
hoops per head in its most-used hoop
sizes, such as for left-chest embroidery. If
a hoop breaks, you still have at least two
hoops per head. Also, at the beginning of

Hooping Station

Pegboard or shelves

a job, hoop all three sets. This way, if an
interruption prevents hooping the next
run completely, you have a "draw" pile.
Efficiency at the machine can be one
of the most enjoyable areas of production. Some people don't think it sounds
like fun to embroider 200 quantities of
the same thing, but I suggest trying it
on a multihead. I always enjoyed seeing
how I could gain efficiencies at the machine. Even something small - such as
hooping the entire next run by the end
of the third color instead of the fourth
- was fun.
Anyone who has ever enjoyed production knows what I'm talking about. It's a
game, but a satisfying and worthwhile one.

FINISHING
Some shops require the embroidery
machine operators to do the finishing
and inspection. For space, productivity
and focus reasons, this generally isn't a
great system. Still, whether it's practical
depends on the type of work.
Generally, it's best to have a finishing area set up specifically for trimming,
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Impressions - September 2015

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