IndustryWeek Names Toyota Among Best Plants in North America

IndustryWeek magazine selected Toyota Industrial Equipment Mfg., Inc. (TIEM), Columbus, Ind., as one of the 10 Best Plants in North America. The 22nd annual IndustryWeek Best Plants Award recognizes plants on the leading edge of efforts to increase competitiveness, enhance customer satisfaction, and create stimulating and rewarding work environments.

The program aims to encourage other manufacturing managers and work teams to emulate the honorees by adopting world-class practices, technologies, and improvement strategies.

“The 2011 IndustryWeek’s Best Plant Award winners demonstrate the rewards for manufacturers who strive for perfection and never relax efforts to improve,” said Jill Jusko, IndustryWeek senior editor. “Toyota’s manufacturing plant, TIEM, exemplifies these very qualities – which ranks them as one of the top manufacturing facilities in North America.”

A panel of IndustryWeek editors, manufacturing experts, and other knowledgeable persons selected the 2011 Best Plants winners based on a scoring system on the factors surveyed, ranging from management and employee practices, to safety, customer focus, technology and environmental stewardship. In addition, each plant had to provide documentation of its achievements and participate in a site visit by the judges. The 10 winning manufacturing plants, selected from all nationwide entrants, are featured in the January 2012 issue of IndustryWeek.