CASE STUDY: Chick-n-Gravy Dinner Line

I. Time Context

May 12 to 16

II. Point of View

The point of view of the case is Ann, the assistant manager and her investigations about the complaint of the supermarket regarding the frozen dinner.

III. Statement of the Problem
The Chick n Gravy Dinner Line formulated two problems and these are the following:
  1. How will the defects be measured and what quality tools will be used?
  2. What should Ana recommend to the manager after knowing the results? 

IV. Objectives
·         To determine the most numbered defect and the most defective product line with the use of quality tools.
·         To address the solution to the manager.

SWOTE Analysis
Strength:
·         Responsible personnel were assigned fast to cure the problem. Based on the case, the firm that produces this Chick-n-Gravy frozen dinners is good on managing customer complaints because right away, after receiving complaints, the manager then ask her assistant to investigate on the complaints and recommend solution.
·         A Frozen dinner firm gives theircustomers a quick healthy dinner that would fit their busy lifestyle.  
·         .Handling on customer complaints and checking on customer satisfaction.
·         Easily detect problems in the production area.
·          Chick-n-Gravy frozen dinner products are improperly sealed, and if frozen dinners are improperly sealed, this may cause shortening of its life and spoilage. 

Weaknesses:

·         The company has too many defective products that had already reached their customers. It means that they don’t have a well-trained Quality Control Engineers or Facilities and operators.

·         Their Maintenance capabilities fall under the Breakdown maintenance that fixes the problem when it arrives rather than Preventive maintenance where in problems is being prevented even if it haven’t arrive yet.

·         Numerous numbers of complaints from the Supermarkets.

·         All sources of problem were found on all production lines that were used for observation purposes.

·         Money, time and effort were wasted because of the outputs that passed the Quality of the company but don’t have good quality at all.

·         Ann had detected the problems but she didn’t find out the main source or contributor of the problem, is it the machines, personnel’s, operators, engineers, facilities or shipment crews.

Opportunity:

·         Raising the quality of the products by means of eliminating the problems.

·         All this time the number of customers of the firm might increase if they already figure that problems are occurring in the production area.

·         Trust for the firm can also be increase.

·         Product Engineers or Quality Control Engineers must be put in the production Area. For a proper inspection must be done every now and then.

·         If the problems had occurred because of the short time span they have, a planner must also be put in place for proper scheduling.

Threat:

·         Other companies might use the defect issues as advantages to grab other supermarkets to buy their brand of products.

·         New products might also take over if supermarkets will return the defective/less Quality outputs that the firm produced.

Environment:

Chick-n-Gravy frozen dinner, Line 1 and Line 2.

Alternative Courses of Actions:

·         Hire new skilled workers and repair or upgrade machines and trained the workers to improve their skills. A Quality Control Engineer must be put in the position.

·         Despite of using Breakdown Maintenance, the firm must use Preventive Maintenance that is proven to more effective and least costly.

·         Conduct another test to detect the source of the problem, the workers, equipment’s/machines or the facilities.

Conclusion:

		Under filled					Missing Item					Spilled/Mixed					Unacc. taste					Improper seal
			#1	#2				#1	#2				#1	#2				#1	#2				#1	#2
Morning			0	1	1			11	0	11			2	2	4			14	7	21			0	5	5
Afternoon			3	1	4			0	7	7			4	6	10			0	1	1			1	5	6
			3	2	5			11	7	18			6	8	14			14	8	22			1	10	11

This gives a breakdown by morning/afternoon as well as Line #1/Line #2. Histograms (totals, morning/afternoon, and Line #1/Line #2) could be constructed to highlight problem areas.

Overall, 70 defects were found, 22 of which were classified as unacceptable taste, making this the most frequent problem. The next most frequent was missing item with 18 occurrences, and then spill/mixed, with 14 occurrences.

Looking more closely at these three categories, we can see that 14 of the 22 unacceptable tastes were accounted for by Line #1 in the morning, and the remainder was Line #2, also in the morning. Line #1 exhibited a similar morning problem: all 11 occurrences were in the morning. Line #2 had all 7 of its occurrences in the afternoon. 10 of 14 occurrences of spill/mixed defects occurred in the afternoon.

In the improper seal category, 10 out of 11 occurrences were for Line #2.

With this the Manager can make a proposal on what problem to eliminate first, the top contributor of problem or vice versa.

Recommendation:

Ann should focus on investigating what might be causing taste problems in the morning on both lines, morning problems on Line #1 for missing items and afternoon problems for Line #2 for missing items. Spill/mixed has afternoon problems on both lines, and there are seal problems on Line #2 throughout the day.

Credits to IEVILLE