Company Profile: Buckingham Manufacturing was founded in 1896 when its founder Wilmont Stevens hand-crafted the first climber in his blacksmith shop. Since its founding, Buckingham has provided climbing and safety equipment for utility linemen, arborists and construction workers. Buckingham’s products are marketed both in the United States and Europe.

Situation: Buckingham had reached a point in its company life where it was necessary to expand its customer base. Its line of climbing and fall protection equipment was well known domestically and it was a supplier to several well known utility firms. However, it became apparent that to expand their business at home as well as to break into the European markets, they were going to have to differentiate themselves from their competition. An obvious solution to their problem was to seek certification to the ISO 9000 Standard. Without that certification, they would not be competitive in bidding situations.

With that thought in mind, they approached AM&T looking for assistance in moving toward ISO certification.

Project: AM&T and Buckingham began a close partnership through which a series of steps were taken to move them toward readiness for certification.

• Buckingham’s management attended a detailed briefing intended to provide a uniform understanding of the requirements of the Standard and how they impacted Buckingham’s operations.

• Buckingham’s ISO representative and AM&T jointly identified the processes which were in place and evaluated each one in terms of its ability to meet the requirements of the ISO Standard.

• A quality policy manual was prepared which addressed each clause of the ISO Standard and reflected Buckingham’s policy toward it.

• With AM&T’s support, operating procedures were developed which documented each process in terms of its internal operations and, where necessary, its interaction with other processes. Procedures were reviewed with process owners and management and, once finalized, were implemented.

• Once the system was implemented, AM&T began to perform internal audits to ensure that it was functioning properly and that it was in compliance with the Standard.

Once the implemented system demonstrated proper compliance to the Standard, Buckingham began the search for a Registrar who would certify it. They elected to use a European registrar who, in addition to certifying their system to the ISO Standard, could certify selected products to the CE Mark requirements. Achievement of CE Mark status provides the ability to market products throughout the European Community.

Buckingham’s implemented quality system was officially certified to the requirements of the 1994 version of the ISO Standard. It has been re-certified to the more stringent requirements of the ISO 9001:2000 Standard and selected products were awarded CE Mark designations. As a result, Buckingham is realizing a substantial improvement in its operating profits from new customers in both the United States and Europe.

Testimonial: “Through AM&T’s efforts, Buckingham was able to develop and implement an effective ISO 9001 quality management system which produced significant improvements in our product yields and provided access to increased numbers of customers both domestically and overseas. They were also helpful in providing access to financial resources necessary to acquire a significant piece of process equipment which will allow us to transform our manufacturing process and realize improved quality and price performance.”

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