The Idea Of Mass Customisation

Optimization of machinery so that production setups are not required for small customizations which can be managed manually.

Customers make demands on the market by routinely expressing their desire for “more”. This has been called “seeking a bigger and better deal”. The demand is for more value, and more options. As they search the marketplace for its offerings, customers are often pleased to see new suppliers. They consider the new offerings, and make decisions about changing their purchasing habits.

Real-world businesses with customers which require product flexibility, in lower volumes, have the beginnings of a job shop production process (Choudhari, Adil, & Ananthakumar, 2012). Such a beginning is further evidenced when the job force is made up of highly skilled employees that are able to help create a wide array of products (Pederson, Dresdow, & Benson, 2013). The job shop process is also very widely used because of its many advantages, and despite the scheduling challenges which it presents (Meredith & Shafer, 2013). Organizations

Company is facing a challenge of potentially higher inventory costs. Rising prices may further result in changes in customer behavior and preferences.

→ customized systems – engage in collaborative design efforts with clients and engineers; once designed, system built by manufacturing alliances then installed and supported by FII

Firms pursuing a specialization strategy often try to develop a competitive advantage based on customer intimacy and try to deliver unique and customizable products or services to meet their customer’s needs and increase their

Customer demand and product preference should be focused on to produce more of what the customer wants and to allow for stock reduction.

Chabot needs to increase the flexibility in its supply chain. Chabot is an innovative product manufacturer trying to utilize an efficient supply chain. In order to be able to meet demand, the company needs to deploy excess buffer capacity. Lead time is not up to par so Chabot needs to increase its inventory if it plans to meet unpredictable demand. This will also help increase Chabot’s level of

On the other hand, prices are the most insignificant buying criterion in High End, Performance and Size segments. No matter how high the prices are, customers in these segments are more preferable to high-tech product. In particular, for the High End and Size segments, ideal position occupies 43% and products’ ideal age is 29%. Furthermore, reliability is the most important consideration to customers in Performance segment. Hence, Niche Differentiation is a proper alternative for these three segments.

Based on the changing electronic industry and business demands, Custom Molds should correct major issues by adopting the following recommendations. The molding process should focus on small batch sizes and purchase more small and customizable machines. More workers should be hired to oversee the production since there is more labor needed to prepare the machine for each customized mold. The plastic parts process should focus on few but large capacity specialized machines. Fewer workers will be needed to oversee this process because there are few setting changes needed. To control the problem of late deliveries, a better communication system between offices should be implemented so workers do not need to walk back and forth between offices. Orders should also be accepted based on the ability to complete the product in the time that is promised to the customer. More efficient communication between all departments would result in a more accurate estimated delivery time. To control errors resulting in defective parts, Custom Molds should invest in moving the testing center to a more centrally located area. More frequent testing and less walking will increase efficiency and decrease defective products. An alternative option to the recommendations listed, is for Custom Molds Inc. to evaluate the market for the products they produce and to decide to make either molds or plastic parts. The key factors that should be considered while

Produce more products so there is less restocking issues but not more than the market calls for (supply and demand),

Highly customization modules are another high risk for K-Mart IT project development. The system is spread out all work flow in the K-Mart system from the demanding planning, supply chain

Product flexibility addresses the firm's ability to handle difficult, nonstandard orders; to meet special customer specifications; and to produce products characterized by numerous features, options, sizes, and/or colors. Process flexibility (product mix flexibility) addresses the firm's ability to produce small quantities of products cost efficiently so that changes in product mix are easy to accommodate. Tangential to these two types of flexibility, volume flexibility addresses the firm's ability to rapidly adjust capacity in order to accelerate or decelerate production in response to changes in customer demand. Chaganti, Chaganti, and Mahajan (1989) identified product scope as the relative breadth of the firm's product line. Thus, product flexibility clearly maps well to their product scope, and process flexibility has some overlap with product scope. It could be argued that small business managers that compete with flexibility would employ q uality strategies and tools that facilitate the ability to design and produce a variety of items. Therefore the main exploratory proposition is:

Improving the quality of a company’s product offering is consistent with achieving responsiveness, as is developing new products with features that existing products lack. In other words, achieving superior quality and innovation is integral to achieving superior responsiveness to customers. Another factor that stands out in any discussion of responsiveness to customers is the need to customize goods and services to the unique demands of individual customers or customer groups. For example, the proliferation of soft drinks and beers can be viewed partly as a response to this trend. Better customer responsiveness can further be provided with superior design, and superior after-sales service and support. All of these factors enhance responsiveness to customers and allow a company to differentiate itself from its less responsive competitors. In turn, differentiation enables a company to build brand loyalty and charge a premium price for its

While the customized nature of B&B’s products isn’t conducive to the type of streamlining seen in volume manufacturing applications, they can