Hatco
Hats Off to Hatco!
Stetson® and Resistol®, are brands known around the world! Hatco Inc. is a privately owned company with headquarters located in Garland, Texas. Hatco manufactures western and dress hats that are sold worldwide. Their 250+ employees work in a 150K square foot facility where they’ve been operating continuously since 1927!
The Situation
Established in the early part of the 20th century, the Hatco facility in Garland was ready and positioned to implement production upgrades.
The Solution
Hatco selected TMAC, the U.S. Department of Commerce Manufacturing Extension Partnership affiliate in Texas to move the project forward.
TMAC manufacturing specialists and UT-Arlington graduate engineering students teamed with the company to make significant improvements to the manufacturing facility.
Partnering with Dallas County’s Richland College-Garland Campus on a workforce skills grant, TMAC worked directly with Hatco’s management team and staff to learn the basic principles of a Lean Enterprise including “5S” and sustainable practices. Employees learned how to spend more time making hats and less time moving them through their large facility. “5S” represents the 5 disciplines for maintaining a visual workplace. 5S is short for sort, set in order, shine, standardize and sustain.
The Results
Production improvements have increased Hatco’s capacity. This allowed the company to respond quicker to customer demands.
Employees are now allowed to leave early, with full pay when production goals have been met. An additional benefit to staff leaving earlier is the ability to turn off the lights and boiler to reduce utility costs by more than 3%.
The energy savings are augmented by the reduction of Hatco’s CO2 emissions. Their environmental impact has now been reduced by more than 189,000 pounds per year.
[dt_sc_testimonial name=”Dan Brown” role=”Vice President, Operations” image=”https://sixsigma.jacszen.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/Wolters.png”][dt_sc_hr_invisible]TMAC did an outstanding job; our thanks to UT-Arlington for the good work.[/dt_sc_testimonial]
