Seafish, the UK''s authority on seafood, has brought pioneering Lean Sigma techniques to the UK seafood industry for the first time – with the first two companies to receive training reporting excellent benefits for their businesses.
The Lean Sigma programme gives companies the tools and techniques required to accurately identify and progress areas for improvement and provides a framework and statistical tools to create rapid transformation.
Foodvest-owned businesses, Young’s Seafood and The Seafood Company, have both achieved major savings and increases in production after taking part in the Lean Sigma training programme.
The specialised training has helped Young’s to increase sales volume of its fast-growing coated fish ranges by an extra 1,000 tonnes a year. The company has also improved production efficiency at a key line at its South Quay site in Grimsby by 35%.
Within The Seafood Company’s Marsden Road site in Grimsby, improvements in consistency and accuracy of pack weights has significantly reduced the company’s wasted product. While in Fraserburgh, The Seafood Company has made substantial savings by increasing the capacity and production quality of the kilns used to produce smoked fish.
Paul Williams, Research Director of Seafish, said: “Seafood businesses had not been well catered for in terms of business improvement support and we knew that there were specific issues that could be successfully tackled. We provided match funding for this training in conjunction with the Financial Instrument for Fisheries Guidance organisation (FIFG) and also made our own personnel available to join the project teams.”
“It’s all about transferring knowledge into companies. If any other seafood companies would like to learn more about continuous improvement techniques we will be pleased to hear from them,” he added.
