Gilman Precision’s Promise: A Shipment Made on Time

Gilman Precision in Grafton, WI, delivers customized spindles and slides in a timely and efficient manner.

Developing customized slides and spindles for a variety of industries and applications since 1952, Gilman Precision provides expert service as well as quality customer care.

“We’re very proud of our ability to ship on time when we said we would,” Gilman Precision COO Michael Weiland said. “Our ‘Promise Date’ is going to be a date that we can deliver on and we will deliver on — that’s important so customers can plan.”

To maintain consistently accurate lead times, Gilman Precision employs two specific methods: postponement strategy and vertical integration.

“Everyone would like it tomorrow, in our business with well over half our items being made to order — that’s not feasible next day,” Weiland said. “But we do try to cut our lead times down with these strategies.”

In the postponement strategy, Gilman stocks components or semi-finished parts that are commonly used in its customized slides and spindles, keeping the pieces in inventory until a customer is in need.

The end identity is postponed until Gilman gets an order, Weiland said, when “we’ll pull these half-finished items out of stock and make the component. Many times we can ship the same day we get the order.”

When it comes to vertical integration, Gilman’s flexible work staff with an average of 24 years experience plays a big role.

“We do a lot of the value-added work here, we turn a lot of steel and cast iron into finished product,” Weiland said. “We don’t rely on outside firms to do that work for us, we believe we have better quality control in-house — and we make sure we hit our timelines, so we’re not relying on anyone else.”

Gilman’s production, scheduling purchasing and shipping departments meet daily to go over the status of customer orders. All systems are held together through a certified ISO quality management system.

“It provides a great framework for both improvements out on the floor, to monitor ourselves and for monitoring existing processes to know if we’re heading in one direction or the other,” Weiland said. “We find that invaluable and we use it obviously on a daily basis.”

As an added incentive to ship on time, delivery performance is a key component to the employee’s quarterly bonus.

A final step that ensures Gilman’s on-time shipments is the inventory carousel system the company uses to maintain accurate knowledge of the half-million dollars worth of components stored inside.

Gilman understands its customers’ need to have their orders on time, as many are using the components for end products or as part of their build or assembly processes — and a delay in Gilman’s shipment means a delay for the customer’s product.

“They have certain timelines they need to meet, so it’s very important that we meet the timelines that we say we can deliver in,” Weiland said.

Gilman Precision has been dedicated to the advancement of high precision solutions that improve efficiency and achieve longevity since 1952. The company develops customized slides and spindles for value-added engineers with exacting needs and standards, providing expert service for virtually any manufacturer’s equipment

If you’ve got a question on ordering a spindle or slide, contact us at 800-445-6267 or sales@gilmanprecision.com.