Southbound Ch. 09-10

"I won't pretend I'm as good as Dave," he said, "but I know what you need and I'm here to make sure you get it. Financial guidance, I guess we could call it."

"Yeah, that's about it. How do you feel about working here?"

"The more I talked to Dave, the more enthused I was about the job. This size of operation is ideal for me. I'm not lost in an accounting department, doing some obscure analysis of sales versus inventory. I won't pretend I'm an expert in everything, but I've had a really good grounding in a number of facets of running a business and this is my chance to put that to good use."

"Tell me about yourself," I asked.

"Well, born nearby in Stockton, educated at Sacramento State, worked at a construction firm for three years, moved on to work for a family business in Fresno. Big mistake."

"Why?"

"I don't know if it's common to all family businesses, but it was like a chess game where the rules only counted some of the time. I was constantly being given contradictory instructions that made the job much more difficult. I stuck it out for almost two years before I quit and went to work for D & H Trucking. They are big and I was a little guy in the accounting pool, despite my experience. So, until I heard about this opportunity, I was just marking time."

"Are you married?"

"Nope. Haven't found the right woman yet. I'm trying to be patient, but time marches on. I'm thirty-six, so the idea of having a family is slipping away."

"Well, take it from the voice of experience. Be patient. I'm forty-three and I'm just getting to know what I've been missing. It's never too late," I grinned.

"Thanks for the advice. So ... do I get the job?"

"Yes. Dave's recommendation is good enough for me. I think we can work well together. I'm going to rely on you to be my right hand man and keep me from making dumb mistakes. My background is sales and that's what I'm comfortable with. You, Bobby Lee, and Wick Landers are going to be important to me and this operation."

I stood and stuck out my hand. "Welcome to Flex-Tek. Can you start Monday?"

"Yes I can. Thanks. You won't regret this, I promise you."

Lucas left and I called Dave to thank him for finding my financial guy. I was pleased that he was local and could start right away. I could put him with my loaner accountant from Langley, Calvin Dodge. Another piece of the puzzle in place.

Bobby Lee Turpin showed up early on the following Monday, driving a big black Ford F350 crew-cab diesel. It was spotless and looked like it was brand new. He'd left Friday morning from Monroe, driving more than six hundred miles a day.

"I thought you'd have killed a few bugs along the way," I said as Fiona and I greeted him in the parking lot.

"Took it through the truck wash last naht. I hate a dirty truck jes' lak I hate a dirty operatin' flowah."

"We're going to get along just fine, Bobby Lee," I grinned. "I feel exactly the same way. Have you met Fiona Alexander yet?"

"Yes suh, I have. Nace to see y'all agin, ma'am."

"Nice to see you too, Bobby Lee."

"I've got you booked in at the Microtel," I said. "It's a decent place and the company will look after the cost for the first month."

"Thank y', suh. That's generous of y'all."

"You're welcome. Come on in and we'll get you set up in your office."

"Is he always this polite?" Fiona whispered as we returned to my office.

"So far. He can't bring himself to call me Andy and you will always be Miss Alexander or Ma'am I suspect."

"Only for a while," she said, poking me in the ribs with her elbow. "How about that. A real southern gentleman."

"And here's you, hookin' up with a nawthener," I drawled.

"I refuse to call it 'hooking up,'" she said indignantly.

Time was rushing by at break-neck speed as we hurried to get the equipment installed and begin the training. It was just as well the pouch machine hadn't arrived yet as we had organized chaos on the plant floor as two crews were working feverishly to get the new press and laminator installed. Bobby Lee and Wick were constantly there, watching every step of the procedure.

When there was a lull, Bobby Lee was phoning all our existing employees and inviting them to come in a see what was going on. There was a method to his invitations. He wanted to observe just what he had on his hands for crew, and he wanted his crew to see what they had to look forward to.

As part of the modernization, Leo had provided funds to keep our key people on the payroll in order not lose them to another job. Despite the fact that it was an expensive process, it preserved our core skilled people, and Bobby Lee's keeping them involved in the modernization process made them feel part of the new company. I don't think any of us could calculate just how many people he kept from wandering off, but I'm confident it was several. Replacing them would have been an expensive proposition.

What I hadn't counted on was the flow of new business that had already begun to show up. Interestingly, it was almost completely from Fiona's customer base. What a surprise ... not! In addition, we had requests for quotations and proposals from several new accounts that Fiona had approached, warning them that our production was unlikely to be running before April. It didn't seem to matter. These new accounts wanted to know what we were capable of, how much would we sell for, and when we could deliver.

"This is a dangerous deal, Fiona," I warned her. "The deliveries you're proposing are based on the assumption that we will be operational on time and making good product. What happens if we have a problem and can't meet those dates?"

"Simple," she grinned. "We call Langley and they'll bail us out."

I shook my head. I was now seeing Fiona, the sales person. Obstacles were there to be surmounted ... kicked out of the way to success. It put that much more pressure on me to do everything possible to get us up and running.

The laminator was the first piece to be ready for trials. We had two experienced crews available from the old laminator, but solventless was a whole new technology for them. In addition, cure time was a minimum twenty-four hours before further processing, including slitting to width. It was a relief to see the men catch on fairly quickly to the automated controls. But what really stuck out was Bobby Lee Turpin.

He was head and shoulders above his men in more ways than one. If any of them had trouble working for an African-American, it sure didn't show. I never heard him raise his voice or say anything that wasn't encouraging to his crew. I already had a nickname for him, one I stole from golf: Big Easy.

"He's that all right," Ralph nodded when I mentioned it to him. "He's a natural born leader. Mind you, being as big as he is, who's going to argue with him?"

"I've got you to thank for him, Ralph. And Wick looks just as effective, except he's totally different."

"Yeah ... kind of like a ping pong ball, bouncing all over the place. By the time we get this machinery in place, I have a feeling he's going to know every nut and bolt, top to bottom. We've got Bobby Lee to thank for him. I think those two are going to let me get home a little earlier than I'd hoped."

The press installation was a much more complex project, but the crew from Verona, Italy, were professional and worked steadily to get it ready. Wick told me that the best thing about it was all our services were in the right place and matched up with the equipment just as they should. That wasn't always the case in some of these jobs. There always seemed to be some problem with the electrical or duct work being incompatible or in the right location.

Fiona spent her time out in the market, drumming up more new business. Some of it, like pouches, went to Langley, but a lot of it was destined for our new equipment. I was beginning to think she took a wicked glee in piling on the pressure. I kept my thoughts to myself. Bobby Lee didn't need any more heat.

We were a couple of bodies short of two press crews and Bobby Lee and Ralph had been interviewing prospects who had responded to our advertisements for jobs. The response was better than Ralph had expected and we were able to find four good candidates with press experience, although none of them had worked on these new, automated presses.

It turned out that Wick was a computer guy. We were sitting in our little lunch room off the shipping area, taking a coffee break. I found I was spending at least half my day on the shop floor, watching the progress.

"I got turned on when I first worked with Allen-Bradley controllers years ago," he said as we talked about modern equipment. "I could see that was the way to go and things have just progressed from there. The big thing that had to change was shielding the CPU from outside fumes, electrical interference, heat and moisture. It's not like a desktop unit that just needs to be cooled with a fan and kept dust-free. Most operating floors are a hostile environment and these units need to be protected. The newer designs take that into account."

I was learning a lot from Wick, and some from Bobby Lee. Wick was teaching me what made these machines tick. Bobby Lee was teaching me what production management was all about. We had a number of women in the workforce and Bobby Lee was the same with them as he was with the men. However, one look told you that the women held him in awe. He towered above them and yet had a quiet, soft-spoken way about him. I was smiling to myself, imaging what those ladies must have been thinking.

"What are you grinning about," Fiona said, catching me in one of those thoughts.

"Just watching Bobby Lee with the women. He's got them wrapped around his little finger."

"Yeah ... big surprise," she snorted.

"So ... what do you suppose they are thinking?" I needled.

She turned to me and gave me an elbow. "You don't need to know."

"You just told me," I chuckled.

"Can you blame them? He is something else."

"So ... you're having thoughts about him too, huh?"

"Now and then," she smirked, giving me another elbow.

I thought it was best to drop the subject, but I was pretty sure that every woman in the plant must be wondering about him. Old clichés die hard.

We missed the March 31st deadline for starting up the press by only two days. There was a crowd around it as the installation and training crew watched the first test print come off onto the winder. It wasn't running very fast, but when Bobby Lee brought the first cut sample to the light table, I was one nervous guy.

The factory installation boss, our supervisor, and Bobby Lee crowded around the sample for several minutes. At length, Bobby Lee waved me over to the table.

"Have a look," he said, passing me the press magnifying glass.

I looked carefully at the screen and transition areas for any distortion or fill. They had only run about three thousand feet at four hundred feet per minute, so it wasn't a full out test, but I liked what I saw. The solids were full and sharp, and it looked like we were laying down the right amount of ink in the process areas. I grinned at Bobby Lee, slapped him on the shoulder, nodded to the other two and turned to our audience, giving them a fist pump.

I heard the woo-hoo's and other celebratory yelps as the crew began to approach to see the sample for themselves. In the meantime, the press was running again, this time at a higher speed. I was watching the web TV monitor for print registration while the factory guy was freezing the frame regularly to inspect both register and print quality. So far so good. He was upping the speed by a hundred feet per minute until it was getting near the peak operating rate.

I didn't realize how tense I was until Bobby Lee came over to me.

"I see y'all is breathin' agin," he chuckled.

I nodded. "Looks good so far."

"Got to git our people tuned in now," he offered.

Again, I nodded. It was one thing to run a test with the factory rep in charge, it was another for the day-to-day operators to duplicate that.

The press computer came with start-up and running programs that pretty much gave the operators step-by-step instructions on what to do and when to do it. However, there was no substitute for experience and throughout the next week, that's what Bobby Lee gave each team of operators.

By the following week, we were ready to run our first full production order. It was a reverse printed substrate in polyester, mostly line print with some process. Naturally, it was for one of Fiona's customers. I might have known she'd be first in line. She drove over a hundred miles to be there when it ran.

There was quite an audience when they prepared to run the order. It would take about seventy minutes, according to our calculations. Not a long run, but enough that we should get a good evaluation. She stood beside me, watching intently as the crew went through the start-up. When the lead pressman signalled he was ready to run, I felt Fiona reach for my hand and hold it tightly.

Seventy-eight minutes later she was blinking tears from her eyes as the crew pulled the last roll off the press and moved it to the laminator. Fiona had a batch of pull tear sheets in her hand as souvenirs. We would be laminating the order later that afternoon and I was certain she would be around for that event too.

I called Leo and as luck would have it, both Dave and Ralph were in his office at the time. He put the call on speakerphone.

"The press run is done and it looks great, guys. We have two more orders for the press this afternoon and we'll laminate the first order then as well."

"That's great, Andy," Leo said enthusiastically. "Congratulations. It'll be good to see some finished products go out the door."

"And some invoices," I heard Dave say.

"We didn't miss our mark by much," I said. We should be into full production mode by the middle of April as planned. I've got to thank Ralph for all his help, especially for finding Bobby Lee and Wick. They are already making a hell of a difference."

"A good team gets good results, Andy," I heard Ralph comment.

"By the way, I tried to get a bet up here on whose order would be first. No one would bet with me," Leo laughed.

"Smart men," I chuckled. "Fiona's customer is going to be impressed. I know she is. She's already plotting the pecking order for new business. I can feel the pressure already."

"I'm happy for you, Andy," I heard Leo say. "You're getting things going just as I hoped you would. You're going to make Tracy a big success, I just know it."

"Not without help," I reminded him.

"Andy, give me a call at the end of the week. I want to hear how things are going and I have something to discuss with you."

"Sure. I'll call Friday afternoon if that's okay."

"Before four o'clock, please," he laughed. "I've been told I'm going out to dinner that night."

"Hah! Bernice has you by the collar, eh?"

"Always has, always will. Talk to you Friday ... and congratulations again."

"Thanks guys," I said and hung up.

Fiona was standing at the door to my office and had probably heard my half of the call.

"I'm so charged up that I can hardly sit still," she said, demonstrating her excitement with her voice and her actions.

"I noticed. I'm glad you're happy with what you see," I said, hoping she would calm down, although I didn't see any sign that she would.

"The first four orders on the production schedule are mine," she giggled.

"What a surprise. Who did you have to bribe to get that?"

"No one. Of the first eighteen orders in the schedule for this week, eleven of them are mine. Sandra and I are very good friends," she said, trying to pass it off as a routine comment.

Sandra Cummings was in charge of scheduling the plant, just as she had been at Statewide. She knew her job and did it well by all accounts. She told me that she would have to adjust to having just one press instead of two, and no pouch machine for a while, but with the expected output of the new press, she was satisfied she could cope.

Sandra was no wide-eyed optimist. She tended to be conservative in her scheduling in case the unexpected cropped up. That seemed to be a normal trait in people who did that job. Both Clary and Paula in Langley were of the same mindset. I was pretty sure that there was a likely conspiracy between Sandra and Fiona. I wouldn't interfere unless it became a problem, but I would watch it.

To Be Continued