Expert Interview: Kevin Meyer on Driving Lean Transformation and Onshoring *

Show notes: https://www.leanblog.org/20  Remastered July 2021 The LeanBlog Podcast is back with episode #20, our guest is Kevin Meyer, the founder of Superfactory Ventures, which can be found at Superfactory.com. You may know Kevin from his popular blog, Evolving Excellence. We'll be talking about a number of lean topics including his upcoming panel moderation at the Kellogg Manufacturing Business Conference, being held in Evanston IL in May. If you enjoy this podcast, I hope you'll check out the rest of the series by visiting the LeanBlog Podcast main page. Show Notes and Approximate Time, Episode #20 1:30 How Kevin got started with Lean 3:00 About the Evolving Excellence Blog 5:00 Blogging as a learning experience 6:00 Kevin will be speaking at Northwestern University, moderating a panel discussion on in-sourcing on on-shoring at their Manufacturing Business Conference 6:20 Companies that have been able to build manufacturing competencies in the U.S., rather than running overseas, looking at total cost, rather than just labor cost 8:00 The conference is May 12, open to registration by the public (main conference page) 8:15 A list of companies Kevin has talked about on the blog 9:10 How can we spread the word and fight the perception that you can't do manufacturing here? 9:45 Kevin's example of a custom ski manufacturer who imports very small quantities from China rather than doing it here 10:30 Danaher as a good example of lean and U.S. competitiveness 10:50 American Leather, building furniture here in Texas 12:20 Kevin's example of Avery Dennison 13:30 Are retailers encouraging lean practices or pushing suppliers overseas? 14:30 Are there some valid reasons for building in China? 15:40 Kevin's example of American Apparel 16:30 New Zealand manufacturing and off-shoring pressures 17:30 Kevin talks about lean and the value of experience in the workforce, Whirlpool example of moving to Mexico and throwing away that experience 20:30 The book from the blog, written by Kevin and Bill Waddell : Evolving Excellence: Thoughts on Lean Enterprise Leadership