Skip to Navigation | Skip to Content
College Industry Council on Material Handling Education

Plant Consolidation

Download Full Case Description in PDF format
Author: Charles J. Malmborg
Department of Decision Sciences and Engineering Systems
Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute
Troy, New York
Keywords: Layout
Product Flow Analysis
Storage System Design

Abstract: In late 1994, Baxter Automotive made a strategic decision to acquire Accro Plastics Corporation of Cincinnati, Ohio. Baxter planned to consolidate Accro's existing technologies within an expansion of the Baxter Automotive Materials Plant in St. Louis, Missouri. The planned time frame for this relocation was a three month period from July 1995 to October 1995. In the process of acquiring and moving Accro's operations following this aggressive schedule, Baxter intends to retain virtually all of Accro's market share in the automotive acoustic business without disruption of deliveries to its two major customers; Ford and General Motors. In addition to creating problems associated with building adequate inventory to cover the three month period during which the Accro operations would be in transit to St. Louis, there was immediate pressure to prepare the St. Louis facility for the installation of the new operations and to start up full scale production of Accro's product lines. The most immediate needs included the siting of the major footings for the new facility expansion in St. Louis. This decision required knowledge of where the major workcenters of Accro's operations would be located in the new facility expansion.

Send mail to CICMHE@mhia.org with questions or comments about this web site.