team photo

Figure 1
project photo

Figure 2
project photo


Team 8

Team Members

Faculty Advisor

Lindsey Fleck
Scott Gaffney
Blanche Gorham
Allison Pfahler

Craig Calvert, Frank Cunha

Sponsor

Other

sponsored by
sponsor logo

After being in the pie business for 20 years, Lyman Orchards sought to optimize their wholesale pie business. To help Lyman accomplish this goal, the team travelled to Lyman Orchards weekly to conduct time studies on their highest selling products. Using this data, the team developed a forecasting model to optimize production by varying employee allocations at each production step. The team presented recommendations to the sponsor based on the bottlenecks identified in the time studies. These recommendations included new floor plans, scoop sizes, and production methods. Excel VBA was utilized by the team to create a model of the freezing process to show the capacity in the freezer according to the dwell times of the products and the rate that the products are being added and removed from the freezer. In order to create more freezer space so the freezer does not become a bottleneck with production increases, Lyman Orchards is working on the possibility of utilizing another building on property. If the new building is put to use, Lyman Orchards would incorporate three freezer trucks into their transportation to freeze the pies overnight at the loading dock of the packing facility. This scenario would allow for higher production in the original production space once the packaging equipment is moved. By implementing the use of the second building and the process suggestions, the team predicts that Lyman Orchards can see an increase of 70 to 80 percent of production.