Well, I think this might be the "new normal" for a while.
As I have stated in previous posts, I am in manufacturing, I print labels on a printing press. I have been in the printing field for over 20 years, manufacturing over 30. I have never seen things like this. Material shortages, material allotment, transportation issues, all these things have created the "perfect storm".
We were having a discussion the other day at work about a job I was getting ready to produce. Our art department guy was talking about how he was walking through the store and just happened to glance at a box of cereal on the shelf. He noticed that there was a lot of trash in the black print on the box. And it was glaringly obvious, even to the untrained eye. There are reasons for this.
In manufacturing, you have certain standards to maintain, one of the most important being quality control. In the "good old days" (think @ 2 years ago) quality control standards were such that a certain amount of waste was acceptable to maintain quality. There were times when issues arose that drove the waste up until the issue was corrected, and the product was sorted through to pick out what was "acceptable" to go to the customer while the rest was trashed. Manufacturing is driven by production and waste. Production is based on industry standards of setup time, run time, downtime, waste, quality. This is all based on material supply and costs, along with man hours, etc.
You already have stress trying to meet minimum production standards, especially with equipment problems, etc. Now we have not only supply chain issues, we now have to meet the same production standards with less material, less time, less waste and less manpower than ever. Never have I seen the printing industry like this. Sure, we had some delays of getting materials due to acts of nature, accidents, etc. Those would be maybe a day or two. Now? The industry is now being allotted paper. We cannot take on any new customers, or produce a new label for the same customer if it cuts into those allotments. Even the paper manufacturers cannot take on any new clients. And to make matters worse, a lot of companies, including my company, are having our allotments pushed out as much as 6 months away! They are doing this to the smaller companies more so than the larger ones.
So, with the firearms manufacturers, not only are they probably going through the same issues, their demand has increased exponentially due to this administration and the increased violence and cutting back of policing. More people are buying firearms than ever before. This is taxing an already volatile situation. Being in production, you are now stressed out trying to meet even more stringent production demands. You are pushed to produce more with less waste and less mistakes. This leads to more mistakes, more quality issues and more waste. Now the companies are in a position to where their quality standards are having to be modified as far as what is and isn't acceptable. "Minor" imperfections that should be filed down, re-bead blasted, etc. are being re-classified as "acceptable", to be addressed by customer service at a later date. Companies have to do this to make any money, as the prices have gone up exponentially on top of the supply shortages/delays.
I apologize for the long post. This is just what I am not only witnessing, but experiencing personally in my daily workday in the industry. Will things get back to "normal"? I hope so. But for now, we kind of have to have a little more patience and understanding with the products we purchase, not including food safety of course. Never in my 30 plus years in manufacturing have I seen it like this.
