Growth in the U.S.
manufacturing sector continues to rise, according to a May report from the
Institute for Supply Management (ISM). That rise is also reflected in the
country’s 50,000 small to medium-sized machining and metal working
manufacturers. But, for many of these companies, this growth also means
accepting a rapidly changing manufacturing world.
Although 3D and Additive
manufacturing have become industry buzzwords, they may not be the most
important technology smaller manufacturers need to embrace to stay competitive.
Although it may not seem as “sexy” or
“cutting edge” as 3D printers, a more important technology for these companies to
implement may be software-driven shop control systems known as Enterprise
Resource Planning (ERP).
But less than half of America’s
50,000 smaller manufacturers are using ERP software, according to estimates
from Realtrac, a Michigan-based shop control software company focused on small to
medium-sized manufacturers with 5-100 employees.
One company who recently
made the switch to ERP software is Elite Manufacturing, a CNC machine shop
co-founded by three seasoned machinists in March 2013. The company is based out
of White Bear Lake, Minnesota, and manufactures a variety of high-quality
inspection fixtures, machine parts and machine modifications.
While all three founders
have been in machining for decades, they were fearful of diving into a bloated resource-planning
system. It was safer to do what they knew, which involved a bare-bones job
tracker, Excel spreadsheets, QuickBooks, and lots of manual entry.
“Most ERPs out there are
going to run you twenty or thirty thousand dollars just to get started,” said Elite
Manufacturing’s co-founder Paul Fiege. “That was NOT going to work for us, but
we knew we needed to find something better than what we had.”
With that in mind, Paul began
researching the ERP and MRP solutions that might work for his machine shop. He
attended IMTS in September, and happened to see a live product demo from the
Realtrac 10 Performance ERP. The Realtrac team was running simulated live jobs through
the system to show attendees what their job control software could do.
“As soon as I saw the
interface I could see the Realtrac resource planning system was different. They
were getting real-time feedback!” Fiege said, enthused. “It took less than
fifteen minutes for me to see that it did everything we needed - better than
any other planning software I’d seen.”
Because Realtrac was
designed to help growing job shops get to the next level, metal working shops
and smaller manufacturers can get started with Realtrac’s lease-to-own program for
as low as $150 a month.
Another usual barrier to
embracing ERP software is typically the fear of implementation and the overwhelming learning curve of the
software itself. Usually these systems are cumbersome to learn and use. They
are built for large manufacturers, so smaller shops will have to make major
changes in business practices.
Jeremy Klosowski, Director of Sales, said: “At Realtrac, our sole purpose
is to make shop control software implementation easier, so smaller machine
shops don’t get left behind.”
For Elite, that promised
ease of implementation couldn’t have been more true. Just two weeks after seeing
the Realtrac 10 Performance ERP at the IMTS show, and after a short initial
training, the company had the software up and running. It gave them complete control
of their jobs, from initial quote to completed and shipped parts - with no
complications.
“With Realtrac we can
literally go from quoting a job to having it running on the shop floor within
an hour. It takes one click from estimate to job,” Elite’s co-founder Paul Fiege
said. “Before we implemented the software it would take at least a day just to
get a quote out for a bid. Now I can put half a dozen or more drawings into the
system, input the part specs and other details, and have a quote out in as
little as 15 minutes… It has helped us become an established company and a
legitimate player in a very competitive industry.”
About Realtrac
Realtrac is a software company specializing in shop control systems for
machine shops, job shops and
make-to-order metal working manufacturers. The company was founded in the heart
of a machine shop and has served the manufacturing industry for over three
decades. The Realtrac 10 Performance ERP is used by thousands of shops across
North America. For more information about Realtrac, contact Jeremy
Klosowski at 734-793-3811 or jeremy@realtrac.com.
About Elite Manufacturing
Elite Manufacturing is a Minnesota-based
CNC job shop, co-founded in 2013 by three expert machinists and toolmakers.
With forty years of experience, Elite handles all types of jobs, from
inspection fixtures needing a single piece to full-run production jobs. The
shop uses Hurco conversational vertical milling centers, and can take parts
from prints and CAD to complete products with quick quotes and turnaround
times. For more information about Elite Manufacturing visit www.elitemanufacturingmn.com or call Paul Fiege at 651.340.0088.
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