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Leaner process has Huebsch looking sharp
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| Jim Vaudreuil, president of Huebsch Services, stands in front of a picture from the company’s early days in Eau Claire.
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Eau Claire company reinvents itself in a way counter to industry trends
By Barbara Lyon
People must have thought Jim Vaudreuil was crazy.
It seemed pretty clear what Huebsch, the commercial laundry and uniform rental business, should do: If you want to expand, then expand. Build a bigger building, buy bigger equipment, ramp everything up into volume production.
“All my competitors — almost every laundry service company in the industry — are buying big, automated washers and dryers and all kinds of expensive sorting equipment,” Vaudreuil said.
But that’s not what he had in mind. Instead, he was preparing to design a plant expansion around a new process entirely counter to industry trends.
Jason Reineke of Eau Claire puts a rubber band around a carpet that was rolled after it was cleaned at Huebsch Services in Eau Claire.
The smaller, leaner units eventually installed have increased productivity 17 percent and brought the company the Eau Claire Economic Development Corporation’s prestigious Paragon Award.
Jim Vaudreuil doesn’t look so crazy anymore.
Rich history
Donna Dekan of Cadott attaches a button onto a pair of pants at Huebsch Services in Eau Claire.
For 113 years, Huebsch Services has been helping folks in the Chippewa Valley and beyond maintain a clean and tidy image. And while its methods have certainly changed over the years, the company’s mission remains essentially the same today.
When brothers John and Joseph Huebsch founded their commercial laundry in Eau Claire in 1891, their biggest customers were the loggers from the lumber camps scattered throughout the area. In the 1920s, they expanded into linen rentals and dry cleaning.
With the advent of home washing machines, the company shifted its focus from retail laundry, and into commercial linen and uniform rentals.
Debbe Goulet of Hallie pulls Subway aprons from an industrial-sized dryer at Huebsch Services in Eau Claire.
“When wash-and-wear fabrics came out, dry cleaning was a big part of the business,” said Vaudreuil, president and great-grandson of founder John Huebsch. “Almost overnight, our business was in danger of being wiped out.”
So how did Huebsch survive this and so many other transitions?
“Customers are not coming to us just because we can get something really dirty clean, or because they don’t want to wash it at home,” Vaudreuil said. “We’ve changed our focus from being a laundry company to providing custom solutions. We’re an image-building company now.”
In addition to renting and leasing uniforms, matting and towel services for restroom facilities, Huebsch Services also helps companies develop their own distinctive look or brand.
“Time was, most uniforms were dark-colored to hide grease and dirt, or just something employees wore over something so they wouldn’t wreck their own clothes,” Vaudreuil said. “Today’s customers want their own sharp, identifiable look. We offer them help in creating that brand image with lots of colors and style choices for both uniforms and mats imprinted with their logo.
“Branding is not only functional,” he said, “it’s also important as a form of advertising. A uniform can be a tool for building teamwork. And a company that is consciously branding itself feels a responsibility — as do those who represent it — to live up to its brand.”
To develop an infrastructure to support its developing niche market in custom solutions, Huebsch built a plant in Eagan, Minn., to create customized matting. More recently, in a move to streamline its laundry business, the company combined its two Eau Claire facilities — one of them an elderly, multi-level building on Dewey Street — into a single expanded operation on White Street.
At the same time, Vaudreuil seized the opportunity to make what others in the industry would consider some pretty drastic changes based on the premise that bigger isn’t necessarily always better.
The Swedish solution
While visiting his wife’s relatives in Sweden, Vaudreuil got to know the owner of one of the biggest laundry operations in Europe. Touring several plants, he learned about a concept called ‘customer-focused production.”
“In Sweden, they have five people for every four jobs. I asked how they get people to work in a laundry where repetitive motion injuries are always a problem,” Vaudreuil said. “The way we always did things is the way the rest of the industry does it: Go to the customer, pick up the soiled garments, dump them together in big 800-pound machines, pull them out, put them in a dryer, run them through a steam tunnel to get the wrinkles out, put them on hangers, sort them out, and send them back to the customer.”
All too often, problems ensue. The same harsh formula is used to wash all the garments, meaning that less-soiled clothes are over washed and wear out quickly, while dirtier items tend to be under washed. Keeping track of mending and repairs is also more difficult.
The Swedish model, however, showed Vaudreuil a much more efficient way of doing laundry, one quite similar to the way it’s done in countless homes across America. Now, instead of mixing together many garments from many different customers, Huebsch uses smaller, 100-pound capacity machines to process laundry in smaller batches.
Changing any paradigm, however, is always fraught with a certain amount of anxiety. Enter Northwest Wisconsin Manufacturing Outreach Center. Operating under the Stout Technology Transfer Institute, the organization has provided technical assistance to more than 900 small- to medium-sized companies throughout western Wisconsin since its inception in 1994.
Using the concepts of cellular plant layout and flow training, project manager Ted Theyerel and NWMOC staff worked extensively with Huebsch to successfully recreate the commercial laundry process.
“Jim said that what he saw in Europe really sparked his imagination,” Theyerel said. “He told me, ‘I’ve been talking about it and people think I’m absolutely crazy.’ ”
Although Huebsch is not actually a manufacturer, Theyerel immediately saw how the concepts of cellular (a.k.a. “lean”) manufacturing could be applied to help Huebsch set up its new expansion. Along with other members of the Huebsch team, including long-time operations manager Mary Steinke, the two men embarked on what both describe as a journey into the unknown.
“We started talking about what processes they had, how long each took, and what it would take to get everything done in one day,” Theyerel said. “It was the leap of faith Jim needed. Huebsch had the technical knowledge; we had the concepts. We kind of meshed them together and came up with a vision, more than a plan. But Jim had to take that vision and make it happen.”
“When we designed the plant expansion,” Vaudreuil said, “we didn’t have the resources to produce a prototype. We were flying by the seat of our pants.”
‘Better than home wash’
The result of good vision and plenty of employee input was a system that divides the process into “cells” or groups of equipment, each manned by three-person teams who provide a human touch unique in the laundry industry.
Air-conditioned, clean and bright, the newly-expanded Huebsch plant features four uniform cells. Each has two pairs of washers and dryers, a scale, several sorting carts on rollers, a hanging area, a light pressing area, and a mending station. (Also included are individual cells for mats, towels, and new and used garment stock.)
Every item that comes into the plant bears a unique bar code and is scanned, ensuring that nothing gets “lost in the wash.” Workers can make notes on the tracking logistics computer of mending that is needed; the scanning system also helps in the post-wash sorting process.
Cleaning formulas are customized to match the soil levels and to take into account the kinds of clothes — 100 percent cotton, blended fabrics — in the load, resulting in a softer, pH-balanced finish that is comfortable to wear and helps garments last much longer. Using smaller machines also means that chemicals and water are well mixed and thoroughly permeate each article in the washer, unlike prior experiences with the old 800-pound behemoths.
Because uniforms are removed immediately from the dryers, very little pressing is needed and Huebsch was able to eliminate the steam tunnel from the process, saving time, money and energy.
Each cell works with a specific cluster of customers, giving employees a sense of shared purpose and responsibility for the job at hand. Their special brand of personalized customer service is important to the firm’s 4,000-plus customers, most of them small- and medium-sized companies, located throughout western Wisconsin from La Crosse to Trego. It’s also what sets Huebsch apart from its larger competitors.
In addition to helping the company plan its physical plant layout, NWMOC also provided valuable help in training Huebsch employees to make the transition from an assembly-line style of production to the cellular system.
“Jim recognized that this was radically different from the way they were used to doing things,” Theyerel said. “We held training with simulation-type activities to show employees how this can happen and to get them involved.
“Before, people were stuck doing just one thing,” he said. “With the new operation, employees are able to flex around, learn new things and enhance their job skills, which in turn enhances the company because now they have multi-skilled people working for them. Everybody saw the benefits and advantages of customizing laundry loads. It’s huge — no other laundry competitors can do this.”
Vaudreuil agreed.
“It’s less boring, less repetitive, there’s more flexibility, more accountability,” he said. “Our productivity is measured in pieces per operator hour. We went from 71 to 83 pieces an hour, a 17-percent increase. Some cells have hit as high as 93 pieces an hour.”
Embracing new challenges for more than a century, Huebsch Services now heads the commercial laundry industry as a true innovator.
“Buildings are easy to change. It all goes back to having the kind of workforce that is willing to go along,” Vaudreuil said.
“I have been so proud of our people in the last three years. The market is changing; it’s always going to change. Our company’s strength is people who are willing and able to adapt and change. It’s why we’re still here after 113 years.”
Barbara Lyon is a reporter for the Dunn County News in Menomonie. Contact the Chippewa Valley Business Report at (715) 723-5515, or through www.chippewavalleybusinessreport.com.
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