Ver-Mac and Talan – A Partnership with as Much History as Future Potential

Ver-Mac is a third-generation family business founded in 1957, and has carved out a leading position in road signage, safety and lighting equipment manufacturing. Its mission is making roads safe for everyone. The company has designed a range of innovative products—variable-message signs, traffic arrows, speed display panels, mobile traffic lights, speed sensors, light towers and monitoring platforms. The company also provides connected solutions for smart worksites and equipment fleet management. Ver-Mac is also a leader in the Canadian and American markets, distributing its products internationally thanks to its 350 employees and two factories in Quebec and Texas.

Chaos and Apprehension

In 2010, seeing its orders growing steadily and its delivery times lengthening, Ver-Mac was no longer able to meet the demands of its customers. After numerous meetings with supervisors and active listening, the company realized that this wasn’t an easy problem to solve. The team wanted to improve the fluidity of the production line to be able to produce its variable-message signs in a few days instead of several months, but couldn’t figure out where to start.

So, Ver-Mac enlisted the services of an industrial engineer. After a few months, they realized that the difficulties experienced by the company exceeded the capacities of a single expert, who resigned due to the magnitude of the task. However, they offered one last key piece of advice that sowed the seeds of a long and happy collaboration: seek out a firm specializing in process optimization, like Talan.

There was an understandable reluctance about this recommendation. The company had had a disastrous experience with consultants in the past, resulting in significant loss of time and money. Despite all that, confronted with a feeling of helplessness about their future, the Ver-Mac team agreed to explore this option. Each stakeholder had done everything they could to the best of their knowledge without finding a viable solution. The company was ready to hear an external point of view and be open to change.

Conquering Ver-Mac

Talan inspired the Ver-Mac team dream by supporting its position with accomplishments at other companies. After seeing the concrete benefits at one Talan client, the Ver-Mac management team expressed interest in becoming another success story and showing their factories to other companies seeking performance improvement.

Talan brought Ver-Mac’s employees together in small groups to document everyone's vision and aspirations and ensure everyone was on the same page. By first focusing on the psychological aspect of the project, Talan was able to establish an unshakeable climate of trust between the two companies, even before implementing anything in the factory. This solid base allowed everyone to readily accept the changes, defusing any resistance among the teams. Reassured to see that Talan was not there to impose their views, but rather to collaborate for a better solution, Ver-Mac jumped into the project headfirst.

“Talan staff members have helped many of our internal employees grow thanks to their educational approach. Rather than telling us what to do, they gave us food for thought so that we could draw our own conclusions, which is a much more sustainable approach.”

Summary of Developments

2010: Initial Mandate

The first project entrusted to Talan in 2010 was to develop Ver-Mac's operational vision and transformation strategy. The team of consultants applied the concepts of Lean Manufacturing, which are still at the heart of the company's decisions to this day. From then on, the Ver-Mac team embarked on the project with dedication. Their willingness to question their practices without hesitation led to excellent results. In a few weeks, an ambitious transformation program was defined with the first project on the bottleneck equipment—i.e., a revision of the batch planning on the SMT (Surface Mount Technology) line.

While studying the possibility of acquiring a second line at a cost of $500,000, which would also require a reorganization of the space, the Ver-Mac team was surprised, but quite satisfied with the suggested transformation program.

The new performance dashboard was diligently monitored by both the Ver-Mac and Talan teams. Any deviation from the scope of the projects was detected quickly and the issues were addressed immediately. The management mastered the principles explained by Talan and recognized the importance and the benefits of their efforts. Armed with new knowledge, the co-chair of Ver-Mac was even able to reorient practices when new leadership wanted to change planning methods.

Seeing the owners of the client company preserve the original vision made the Talan team very proud. The enthusiasm was quite palpable for pursuing the objectives set out. However, good performance of the plant depended on rather complex aspects such as planning by equivalent units and the launch of production by product mix. Spectacular results were obtained rather quickly—the weekly rate of production went from 24 to 34 units in just a few weeks! All the projects were completed over three years, and they made it possible to achieve a production rate of 55 units per week in the same space, without major investments.

2013: Introducing a New Partner

Year after year, the growth of the signage giant remained constant. That’s why, in 2013, Talan introduced Ver-Mac to the Dancause Group to support it in its strategic development and positioning decision-making, particularly about establishing a new factory in the USA.

This new collaboration has paid off in several ways: great success in the market, the development of distribution networks, the creation of the sales team and the design of the brand image. While these are promising and exciting advances, this rapid progress also resulted in significant pressures on the business organization.

So, Talan helped Ver-Mac review all its business processes in growth management to allow it to become a robust company, and took part in the strategic development of the new American factory. As a leading player, Talan absorbed growth internally and ensured a reliable strategic link between operations and the marketplace. At this point, the factory was able to deliver 60 units per week, still without expansion or investment.

This growth has obviously had a significant impact on the entire supply chain and on production planning. To overcome the shortcomings of the ERP, the sales department used capacity analysis tools to visualize the sales cycle in real time and balance the load according to the production capacity.

“If the right tool doesn’t exist, Talan invents it. The integrated software we use has its limitations, but this has never stopped Talan's momentum. They not only allowed us to make the most of the system in place, but they also improved it. They know how to make do with what they have on hand, and have the means to improve any process, always in collaboration with the internal team and without ever neglecting the training aspect.”

A Close and Unique Relationship

Together, the two teams reached several important milestones, from Talan's 25th anniversary to Ver-Mac's 50th. After so much history, there’s no place for complacency in business. The solid bond of trust between the two companies translates into absolute transparency and a frank collaboration that’s always beneficial. Thanks to this willing relationship, Ver-Mac has developed the reflex of validating the merits of all its improvement projects with Talan before undertaking them.

“We no longer think of Talan as a consultant, but as a floating team that’s part of Ver-Mac, and which comes to help from time to time in the processing of cases. Talan is an integral part of the management and plant implementation committee at Ver-Mac.”

Many more projects are on the horizon for Ver-Mac, which is still thriving after 65 years in business. We can already foresee a robotic welding line, a relocation for expansion of the American factory as well as the integration of Microsoft's Finance and Operations application by Talan. The partnership between the two organizations continues to grow with the arrival of this major project, which will undoubtedly require the employment of a very large number of resources from both companies.

“A successful project requires a balance between the three parts of the process technology people triangle, but it’s the people at Talan and here at Ver-Mac who really run the show!”

Long live Ver-Mac and its partnership with Talan!