The Courier & Advertiser (Perth and Perthshire Edition)
Global reach of city’s manufacturing centre
Fuel pumps factory has customers in more than 160 countries and promotes an inclusive culture, in which all team members are equals
The Dundee manufacturing centre (DMC) assembles petrol pumps and associated equipment for more than 2,000 clients in 160-plus countries.
This year alone, nearly 20,000 pumps will leave the site.
Customers range from oil majors, such as Total, BP or Shell, who could be fitting out hundreds of filling stations at a time, right down to small businesses with just one petrol pump on their forecourt.
But anyone who thinks all petrol pumps made in Dundee are identical would be mistaken.
“It’s very much a bespoke operation at our plant,” said Andy Barton, director of manufacturing at the Dundee site.
“We don’t make a standard product because each customer and market have different requirements, including the number of nozzles, the size of the pump, the climate, the local legislation, and each customer’s own branding.
“The different permutations of petrol pumps we make here can run into tens of thousands.
“Pumps and their associated equipment are highly complex - the average will have over 2,000 different parts.”
The team at the DMC strives to manage supply-chain complexity as efficiently and “lean” as possible, handling parts as large as 2.5 metre long aluminium panels and as small as 3mm pins.
To meet the requirements of their customers, the Dundee workforce has got the assembly of petrol pumps down to a fine art.
Employees can now put a complete pump together in less than 24 hours - just three years ago, this would have taken three days.
Mr Barton is proud of the culture within the Dundee site.
“We don’t have a command and control leadership style,” he said.
“We have an inclusive culture, where everyone is an equal. “It’s more of a team game for us. “When we work as a team, we create an environment where the members can learn from each other and develop their skills in improving work that they do.
“The skills they learn are useful not only in building petrol pumps, but are completely transferrable and can be used in future employment and in life in general.
“When we collectively deploy these skills, the achievements of the team are fantastic - such a powerful force for improvement.
“It makes for an incredibly exciting, positive place to work.”
Mr Barton and his colleagues will have a busy time between now and when the factory extension officially opens in April.
“We’ve started recruiting new team members in the technical and operations functions and will start to recruit and train for the assembly areas shortly,” he said.
“We look for positivity and engagement in our team members.
“Our training programme is in place, so the new team members can expect to be trained and participate in their own development from day one onwards.”
As well as getting the extension up and running, the Dundee team will also have the challenge of running the Wayne product line alongside the existing Tokheim brand.
DMS will also specialise in assembling Wayne payment products which haven’t been made in Dundee before, such as credit-card payment terminals.
“As the DMC factory extension nears completion, we are already well advanced on development of the processes which will be deployed within it,” Mr Barton continued.
“Fine tuning of the shop layout and material flows is in progress.
“Members of the team are working now in Sweden to transfer the knowledge of the Wayne Helix fuel dispenser assembly process to the current and new team members.”