ustomers are voting with their dollars for manufacturers that make a positive impact on the environment while producing high-quality products, which proves sustainability and quality strengthen each other. In fact, Accenture found that sales increased anywhere from 4 percent to 10 percent when batch and discrete manufacturers achieved greater sustainability in their operations.

Besides reducing operating expenses, finding new ways to decrease electricity and water waste goes hand in hand with closing gaps in production. For example, one manufacturer trims scrap as part of its quality management process, and the scrap gets collected and recycled. The company, which previously used millions of gallons of water per month, now captures that water before it goes out to the sewer, chills it, cleans it and pumps it back into the facility, bringing consistency and cost savings. Additionally, the manufacturer’s plants get 35 percent to 40 percent of their power from solar, significantly cutting costs.

Getting certified as meeting both environmental and industry quality standards opens the door to gaining more customers. For instance, Somaschini North America LLC maintains two certifications to compete in the automotive industry. One is ISO 14001, which the American Society of Quality explains is an international standard that specifies requirements for an effective environmental management system (EMS). Somaschini has been certified as a zero-discharge facility.

The company takes an equally rigorous approach to complying with the IATF 16949 standard maintained by the International Automotive Task Force. At its South Bend plant, quality managers regularly use statistical process control (SPC) to track and improve supplier quality from incoming inspections down to product attribute level.

Supply chain track and traceability is the foundation for metal fabricators to improve their sustainability strategies while boosting product quality. This is particularly true where the products or parts must comply with standards for highly regulated industries. These include, for instance, ISO 13485, which specifies requirements for a quality management system for organizations producing medical devices; the International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR), Defense Contract Audit Agency (DCAA), AS 9100 Rev. C standards for the aerospace and defense industry; and the IATF 16949 automotive industry standard.

The best way to improve document control and reduce waste is to expand quality management work so that it tracks the entire production floor’s activity. A good example is at Northern Industrial. In the past, the manufacturer ran into errors that had nothing to do with the actual parts, including a disconnect between electronic data interchange transmissions and the packing slips, bills of lading and invoices. Since then, Northern Industrial has standardized documentation on its ERP system where quality processes are in place and everything is coordinated in a unified workflow. Now labels and packing slips consistently match EDI transactions.

It is important to define an aggressive, yet realistic, roadmap for improving auditing, including final audit document retention that includes quality audit results. Metal fabricators that invest in having stronger audit workflows and retaining audit results can then analyze the accumulated results to see how and where they can improve energy efficiency, as well as achieve greater sustainability in other areas. One metal fabricator found that audits showed excessive energy costs due to metal fabrication machines running extra cycles between shifts due to incomplete work order instructions. By having all audits in a unified database, the quality management team discovered what was going on and solved the problem.

Investments in sustainability and quality can help metal fabricators to attract and grow customers while improving their bottom line. As manufacturers’ investments in these areas continue to grow, more best practices will emerge.