Somerset Operators — Manufacturing

Manufacturing

Plant-floor efficiency, throughput, and process expertise from an industrial engineer who's worked the line and run the business.

What We Do

Most small manufacturers have more capacity than they're using and more cost than they need. We find it — on the floor, not in a spreadsheet.

Assessments

01

Plant Walkarounds & Assessments

A structured walk of your plant with an industrial engineer — looking at flow, layout, material handling, idle time, and the gaps that cost money quietly. Most issues are visible within hours if you know what to look for.

Lean

02

Lean & Waste Reduction

Identify and eliminate the seven forms of waste — overproduction, waiting, transport, over-processing, inventory, motion, defects — applied practically, not as a certification exercise.

Layout

03

Line Layout & Flow

Evaluate how material and work move through your plant. Bad layout is a permanent tax on every unit you produce — and most plants grew organically rather than by design.

Throughput

04

Throughput & Capacity

Understand where your real constraint is and how much capacity you're leaving on the table. Throughput gains from constraint management typically require less investment than adding equipment or headcount.

Quality

05

Quality & Consistency

Find the root causes of rework, scrap, and customer complaints — and build the process controls that prevent recurrence rather than relying on inspection to catch problems after the fact.

Equipment

06

Equipment Utilization

Assess whether your equipment is being used effectively — or whether changeover time, downtime, or scheduling is costing you capacity you're already paying for.

How It Works

Step 1

01

On-Site Plant Walkthrough

Phil walks your plant floor with you — observing flow, layout, equipment, and process firsthand. No questionnaire-first approach. The point is to see the operation as it actually runs.

Step 2

02

Prioritized Findings

A clear findings report tied to throughput and cost impact — ranked so you know what to fix first. Specific, actionable, and written for an owner, not a committee.

Step 3

03

Floor-Level Implementation

Hands-on implementation support on the floor. We don't hand off a report — if you want help making the changes, we're there alongside your team until they stick.

Who It's For

Small and mid-sized manufacturers

Manufacturers with 10 to 200 employees who want to get more out of the plant they already have — more throughput, less waste, better quality — without a large capital investment or a multiyear transformation project.

Particularly useful for plants that grew fast and never had time to optimize, or operations where the owner knows there's room to improve but can't step back far enough to see where.

Who You're Working With

  • Phil — BS Industrial Engineering, UNC Chapel Hill MBA, owner-operator of three businesses
  • Industrial engineering training applied to real plants, not theoretical lean frameworks
  • Blue-collar background: grew up in his father's businesses, understands what floor work actually looks like
  • Owner-operator perspective — focused on what moves the needle for a small manufacturer, not what looks good in a report
  • Engaged directly by Phil, not routed to a junior consultant

Get more out of the plant you already have.

612-567-7244