Casa Sauza is the first company of the world to apply Total Productive Management (TPM) in the agricultural area. Since in my previous blogs I've already talked about the experiences that we've had while moving forward on each stage of the implementation of the TPM methodology, in this blog I want to talk about the outcome and the results that we achieved in the final audit in order to receive the TPM Excellence Award, category A, given by the JIPM.
In my previous blog, I talked about this important topic. One of my readers asked some very interesting questions, so I decided to give them an answer here, as a blog, so everyone else could see them as well. Here there are:
During the 20 years I've been working at Tequila Sauza, we've always been concerned about guaranteeing our consumers with high quality products by controlling our processes so as not to generate non-compliant products.
At Tequila Sauza, we make sure that any product which doesn't meet our requirements and specifications gets identified and controlled in order to prevent its use or its unintentional delivery to the following stages of the production chain.
During my 8 months of experience working at Tequila Sauza, and thanks to the support of the staff, I have developed myself in the verification of compliance with the prerequisites in areas of production process and bottling of tequila in order to avoid contamination at each stage of the process. Such regulation is established in the 22002-1: 2009 NOM or standard which, as a whole, sets the prerequisites for the industry of a company dedicated to the preparation of food.
Over the 10 years that I've been working at Casa Sauza as a storage specialist, I've learned from the handling of the product at the warehouses and its logistics, until it makes it to its final destination, our clients. Due to the growth of the tequila industry, we at Casa Sauza have to innovate in the handling, storage and logistics of our products.
The Master Production Schedule, MPS, is an indicator of what, when, and how many items to produce. Additionally, the information that it generates can be used as an indicator that shows how much we can commit to produce for the client.
In 2019, Casa Sauza acquired new packaging equipment, such as a labelling machine, a packer, a palletizing robot, a trypack and other smaller equipment. I'll here share with you how their installation was made and how we ran functionality tests.
Each year Sauza holds a special supplier event. The purpose of this event is to recognize those suppliers that go above and beyond what is expected from them. Becoming an Alpha supplier is not an easy task to achieve and it is not solely done for the unique prize that is given every two years, but also for being recognized with the prestigious Alpha Supplier title in the eyes of Casa Sauza.
On my previous blog, Bulk Tequila Export, I wrote about the kind of tequila that can be exported in bulk and bottled abroad. I also mentioned the different transportation means that are used for this purpose at the tequila industry. I would now want to keep writing about this topic, focusing on the most important challenges that Casa Sauza has faced and how we managed to meet the requirements of our clients.
In a previous blog, I talked about handling pagues and diseases in the agave plant. I will elaborate a little more about this topic on this blog.