Question

How to do a value stream map (VSM) of the customer ordering process for the X-opoly scenario?

X-Opoly, Inc., was founded by two first-year college students to produce a knockoff real estate board game similar to the popular Parker Brothers; game Monopoly®. Initially, the partners started the company just to produce a board game based on popular local landmarks in their small college town, as a way to help pay for their college expenses. However, the game was a big success and because they enjoyed running their own business, they decided to pursue the business full-time after graduation.

X-Opoly has grown rapidly over the last couple of years, designing and producing custom real estate trading games for universities, municipalities, chambers of commerce, and lately even some businesses. Orders range from a couple of hundred games to an occasional order for several thousand. This year X-Opoly expects to sell 50,000 units and projects that its sales will grow 25 percent annually for the next five years.

X-Opoly’s orders are either for a new game board that has not been produced before, or repeat orders for a game that was previously produced. If the order is for a new game, the client first meets with a graphic designer from X-Opoly’s art department and the actual game board is designed. The design of the board can take anywhere from a few hours to several weeks, depending on how much the client has thought about the game before the meeting. All design work is done on personal computers.

After the client approves the design, a copy of the computer file containing the design is transferred electronically to the printing department. Workers in the printing department load the file onto their own personal computers and print out the board design on special decals, 19.25 inches by 19.25 inches, using high-quality color inkjet printers. The side of the decal that is printed on is usually light gray, and the other side contains an adhesive that is covered by a removable backing.

The printing department is also responsible for printing the property cards, game cards, and money. The money is printed on colored-paper using standard laser printers. Ten copies of a particular denomination are printed on each 8.5-inch by 11-inch piece of paper. The money is then moved to the cutting department, where it is cut into individual bills. The property cards and game cards are produced similarly, the major difference being that they are printed on material resembling posterboard.

In addition to cutting the money, game cards, and property cards, the cutting department also cuts the cardboard that serves as the substrate for the actual game board. The game board consists of two boards created by cutting a single 19-inch by 19.25-inch piece of cardboard in half, yielding two boards each measuring 19.25 inches by 9.5 inches. After being cut, game boards, money, and cards are stored in totes in a work-in-process area and delivered to the appropriate station on the assembly line as needed.

Because of its explosive growth, X-Opoly’s assembly line was never formally planned. It simply evolved into the 19 stations shown in the following table.

Station	Task(s) Performed at Station	Time to Perform Task
1	Get box bottom and place plastic money tray in box bottom. Take two dice from bin and place in box bottom in area not taken up by tray	10 seconds
2	Count out 35 plastic houses and place in box bottom	35 seconds
3	Count out 15 plastic hotels and place in box bottom.	15 seconds
4	Take one game piece from each of eight bins and place them in box bottom.	15 seconds
5	Take one property card from each of 28 bins. Place rubber bank around property cards and place cards in box bottom.	40 seconds
6	Take one orange card from each of 15 bins. Place rubber band around cards and place cards in box bottom.	20 seconds
7	Take one yellow card from each of 15 bins. Take orange cards from box and remove rubber band. Place yellow cards on top of orange cards. Place rubber band around yellow and orange cards and place card in box bottom.	35 seconds

8	Count out 25 $500 bills and attach to cardboard strip with rubber band. Place money in box bottom.	30 seconds
9	Count out 25 $100 bills. Take $500 bills from box bottom and remove rubber band. Place $100 bills on top of $500 bills. Attach rubber band around money and place in box bottom.	40 seconds
10	Count out 25 $50 bills. Take $500 and $100 bills from box bottom and remove rubber band. Place $50 bills on top. Attach rubber band around money and place in box bottom.	40 seconds
11	Count out 50 $20 bills. Take money in box and remove rubber band. Place $20 bills on top. Attach rubber band around money and place in box bottom.	55 seconds
12	Count out 40 $10 bills. Take money in box and remove rubber band. Place $10 bills on top. Attach rubber band around money and place in box bottom.	45 seconds
13	Count 40 $5 bills. Take money in box and remove rubber band. Place $5 bills on top. Attach rubber band around money and place in box bottom.	45 seconds
14	Count out 40 $1 bills. Take money in box and remove rubber bank. Place $1 bills on top. Attach rubber band around money and place in box bottom.	45 seconds
15	Take money and remove rubber band. Shrink-wrap money and place back in box bottom.	20 seconds
16	Take houses, hotels, dice, and game pieces and place in bag. Seal bag and place bag in box.	30 seconds
17	Place two cardboard game board halves in fixture so that they are separated by ¼ in. Peel backing off of printed game board decal. Align decal over board halves and lower it down. Remove board from fixture and flip it over. Attach solid blue backing decal. Flip game board over again and fold blue backing over front of game board, creating a ¼-in. border. Fold game board in half and place in box covering money tray, game pieces, and cards.	90 seconds
18	Place game instructions in box. Place box top on box bottom. Shrink-wrap entire box.	30 seconds
19	Place completed box in carton.	10 seconds

Answer 1

1. Now, working time = 8 hr, break time = 15 mins x2 = 30 min.

Total task time if work days is 200 for 8 hrs a day for demand units of 50000 per year = 650 sec = 10.83 mins

So total available work time = 8hr – 30 mins = 7.5 hr = 450 mins

Maximum capacity per day = available working time/total task time = 450/10.83 = 41.55

Now, annual maximum capacity = daily capacity x no. of working days = 41.55 x 200

= 8310 games a year

For an annual increase of 25% demand the annual capacity is constant

Current capacity           Projected sales

8310                                 50000                    1 year

8310                                 62500                   2 year

8310                               78125                    3 year

8310                               97656                     4 year

8310                                122070                    5 year

The result shows only 16.6% of the sales produced from X-opoly.

2.

Recommendations:

• Stations must be grouped together by their nature
• Time can be saved effectively by avoiding the requirement of putting & removing elastic bands in each station
• Box bottom should be used in station 17 where items will be assembled.
• 3. If my recommendations were implemented then the assembly time will decrease drastically which will increase efficiency at a greater extent.