Design Label Manufacturing.

Manufacturing philosophies sell a lot of books and provide a living for many people. Most smaller business owners believe that grand philosophies, those in the league with Six Sigma, are for big companies with mountains of waste and defects to reduce. Certainly the small companies have philosophies of their own, but in many cases they are based on partial ideas, common sense and hope.

In East Lyme, CT, Design Label Manufacturing Inc. embraced a manufacturing philosophy after more than 35 years in business, a process that stretched the imaginations of everyone involved and which turned the company completely around.

Today the company is enjoying higher sales than ever before, and all of the employees are reaping direct benefits from that success.

Design Label Manufacturing had its beginning in 1962 when it was founded by Dart Brewster. In the mid-1970s, an IBM salesman named Paul Dunphy came to the realization that he faced a choice: either become a lifer at Big Blue, or get out and run his own business. He chose the latter. Paul Dunphy began browsing local newspapers (he worked out of Warwick, RI, at the time) looking for opportunities. Then he got a call from an old childhood friend, an accountant in Connecticut, who told him he might want to take a look at a label converting company.

Paul Dunphy bought the business in 1977, and Design Label Manufacturing has been in the family ever since. It was tricky at first. Brewster was ill, and Dunphy was supposed to have taken over the business gradually, spending a year learning with the founder. But Brewster died shortly after Dunphy came aboard.

Jeff Dunphy, Paul's son, is now the owner and president. "I started working here full time in 1991," he says. "I had always worked in the business in one way, shape or form, in high school and before that, since the early 1980s.

"After college I went into sales," he says, "working in New York and New Jersey for the first four or five of my years here. Then I became sales manager."

Jeff's sister, Kim Dunphy, had a background in finance in New York City. She, too, joined the company, on the same day in 1991 that her brother arrived. She became the chief operating officer in the mid-1990s, and was elevated to president in 1997. Paul, the father, became chairman.

Jeff, however, had his mind on something else--golf. His enthusiasm for the game grew into an aspiration. "I left the business for two and a half years, beginning in 1997, to play golf on the mini-tours in Florida. I was single, young enough to try it, and I figured I'd give it a shot."

Love of the game notwithstanding, the family business called to him. "I came back in 1999," he says. "At that time, Kim was thinking about leaving, and I think that left Dad in a tough spot. I figured it was a good time to return. I became president and Kim left." She came back a year and a half later as CFO.

Jeff Dunphy bought the business from his father in 2002, and today the company enjoys annual sales of between $7 and $8 million. "In 1996 we were about half the size, so we have doubled since then."

Lean Manufacturing 

In 1999, shortly after he returned to the company, Jeff and the company's production manager went to a CMM conference and heard speakers talk about manufacturing philosophy, specifically Lean Manufacturing. "We sat there for an hour and had no idea what they were talking about," he recalls. "We thought: 'We have to find out about this.' We did, and it has done wonders for us. It has improved every process in the building."

Adoption of Lean Manufacturing and World Class Manufacturing principles "gave as a huge turnaround in the company right away. It cut the manufacturing lead times dramatically. Lead times used to be two, two and a half weeks. Now they are five days and under, just through improvement of the process. We are ahead of the curve as far as the industry goes.

"The Lean philosophy goes away from the traditional manufacturing method, which is batch and queue, better price for higher volume, inventory, more work in process at all times, buying things in high volume to deliver in high volume. Lean goes just the opposite way: It's a production method that allows you to go to one-piece flow. A customer can order as much or as little as they want without interrupting the manufacturing process.

"The biggest thing about it is the people," he says. "We're still small enough, and we have smart enough people here to grasp the concept and see the benefits. It goes against everything you've ever heard as a manufacturing employee about how to be efficient. Once you get over that hump and get people on board, it can be really powerful."

At the same time as they implemented the philosophy, Dunphy implemented a profit sharing plan. "It helped tremendously. They saw the good of it in the first quarter when they got a check."

Custom work

"We print on film, paper and foil, but we like to say that what sets us apart is how we do it, not what we do," Jeff says. "Everything is custom here. We do the same things here every day; the label might not be the same every day but the method we use is the same. We have to be repetitive and improve on those repetitive processes."

Markets are mainly food and beverage, he notes, "and we have a large stake in the one-quart oil bottle industry. Because of our ability to turn things around quickly and our advances in prepress, we have taken a lot of work away from offset and gravure houses, so much so that I have a plant dedicated to cut and stack labels." The second plant is nearby, in Old Lyme. Combined space in the two plants is about 18,000 square feet.

Flexo capabilities range from 6.5" to 18" wide. Presses are from Mark Andy, Aquaflex, and the company's original Webtron 650.

"We're maybe a third of the way there with Lean Manufacturing," Dunphy adds. "But there is no 'there'. It's a continuous improvement. I'd say we have just scratched the surface of the theory."

Design Label Manufacturing Inc.

7 Capitol Drive

East Lyme, CT 06333 USA

860-739-6266

[e-mail]

www.designlabel.com

Founded: 1962

Employees: 40

Annual sales: $7-8 million

President: Jeff Dunphy

CFO: Kim Dunphy

Presses: Mark Andy, Aquaflex, Webtron