That’s why we regularly sit down as a company, first all of us together and then department by department, to look at how we can improve. It gives everyone the space to share ideas, be heard, and take part in shaping what we do. Over the years, this way of working has led to many big and small ideas being tested — and just as importantly, it’s made engagement grow because people know their ideas matter.
During one of these sessions, Jimmy, our Maintenance Manager responsible for technical development, presented an idea that would allow us to bring parts of our production back in-house — production we had previously outsourced at a high cost. Thanks to our new workshop, that idea suddenly became possible.
In our briquetting press, the segments on the two rollers wear out quickly. By milling these segments ourselves, we can significantly reduce costs and recover far more material, since we now control the entire process. The milling chips don’t go to waste either, instead they’re reused by our client Uddeholm who supplies us with the raw material for the segments. Everything from the process becomes new steel, creating a fully closed loop and a truly circular solution.
Hardening is done by a local company in Västerås, just minutes from our workshop, which means shorter transport distances, smaller inventories, and faster turnaround times. Milling in-house also gives us tremendous flexibility: we can modify designs, adjust the shape of the briquettes exactly as we want, and even run small test batches to evaluate new ideas.
We’ve now completed our first full set after fine-tuning grinding and tolerances — and the result exceeded expectations. The segments are stronger, which means longer service life, and the total cost has been reduced by more than half, even including our own working hours. Based on this, we expect to recover the full investment in the machine within 12–18 months.
Jimmy led the project from start to finish, with strong support from his colleagues and Production Manager Conny.
– This idea came straight from our day-to-day work, says Jimmy. Being trusted to take it all the way, and seeing it deliver even better results than expected, is incredibly motivating!
Conny highlights the broader impact on the team:
– People really enjoyed being part of the journey, learning new things and seeing one of our own ideas turn into such a success. This is exactly how we want to work.
For us, this is a great example of how continuous improvement, employee engagement and circular thinking come together, and how small ideas can lead to big results.