Every year, beginning back in 1990, the editors of IndustryWeek embark on an annual search for manufacturing excellence across North America, seeking manufacturing facilities that are delivering truly exceptional performances, that are improving customer satisfaction, that are growing their competitiveness, that are creating stimulating and rewarding work environments.
We call this annual search the IndustryWeek Best Plants Awards competition. Each year during this search we rediscover the strength of manufacturing across the continent and we applaud those manufacturers that are engaged in continuing efforts to improve their operations.
And we celebrate the truly exceptional performers.
Without further ado, please join us in honoring this 27th class of IndustryWeek Best Plants Award winners. They are, in alphabetical order:
Firstronic
Grand Rapids, Mich.
Intertape Polymer Group Inc.
Danville, Va.
Johnson Controls, Optima Plant
Cienega de Flores, Nuevo Leon, Mexico
L.B. Foster Threaded Products
Magnolia, Texas
Maclean-Fogg Metform Group
Savanna, Ill.
UTC Aerospace Systems – Aerostructures
Foley, Ala.
“IndustryWeek congratulates the 2016 IndustryWeek Best Plants Award winners and salutes their accomplishments,” says Patricia Panchak, IndustryWeek’s editor-in-chief. “In an ever more competitive manufacturing landscape, the managers and employees in these facilities double down on continuous improvement to achieve ever better performances. We applaud their commitment to talent, technology and process excellence and look forward to sharing their stories.”
What do these winners demonstrate? That manufacturing excellence can be found across North America, from Michigan and Illinois, to Texas, Virginia, Alabama and Nuevo Leon, Mexico.
They illustrate that no single manufacturing sector has a monopoly on excellence. The 2016 IndustryWeek Best Plants winners represent industries as diverse as aerospace engine nacelle components, to batteries, to threaded pipe products for water well drilling applications.
The 2016 IndustryWeek Best Plants winners also share several commonalities. They do not rest on their laurels. Each day is a new opportunity to get better. Every individual is an important contributor to their collective success. And performance is paramount: The IW Best Plants competition seeks comprehensive indications of excellence. The 2016 winners show enviable performances across quality, safety and productivity. They demonstrate industry-leading cycle times. They simply work smarter.
IndustryWeek is pleased to play a role in bringing examples of manufacturing success to a wider audience. The IndustryWeek Best Plants stories will appear in the March/April issue of IndustryWeek and also will be posted online at www.industryweek.com at that time.
Meet the Winners in May
The IndustryWeek Best Plants Award winners will be honored during a ceremony at the 2017 IW Manufacturing & Technology Conference & Expo, where they also will share their stories of operational excellence. The event is May 8-10 in Cleveland, Ohio.
