Bucket brigade implementation in a medical garment manufacturing plant

The Bucket Brigade (BB) production method does not rely on the traditional line-balancing methodology in which the workload is evenly distributed (balanced) among all the stations of the line by assigning specific work elements to each of the stations of the line. That is, work allocation in a bucket brigade line is flexible (unbalanced). The principle of Bucket Brigade is similar to that of the relay race, in that the least experienced runner (slowest) initializes the assembly process and the more experienced one (fastest) finalizes it in order to make up for any lag. This distribution of operators in the production line creates a teamwork scenario in which the operators help each other to complete all the work elements of the product. Since the introduction of new and slower operators into the line is done in the first stations the effect of the labor turnover is smoother than in the traditional method. This is particularly important to the U.S. twin-plant industry, where turnover levels of 25% per month are typical. Another attractive characteristic of the Bucket Brigade method is that since it operates under a ‘pull’ system, work-in-process is dramatically reduced.