Coding Archives - Andel Plastics

Double award nominees

andel_user — Fri, 21 Jun 2024 09:50:15 +0000

It has been a busy week at Andel Plastics on the awards front.

Firstly we received the news that our owner and Managing Director, Helena Flowers has been nominated for a ‘Woman Who Achieves in Leadership’ award. The Woman Who Inspires Network launched in October 2016, in partnership with the FSB (Warwickshire & Coventry Branch). The nomination will be considered and Finalists announced on International Women’s day at Coombe Abbey. Of course we wish Helena all the best, as our inspiring leader and to current and future generations of the manufacturing industry.

Woman who achieves in leadership nominee

To follow that, which took some doing we received the amazing news that we are finalists in the Greater Birmingham Chambers Awards. In the Excellence in manufacturing Award.

The award nomination revolves around the innovation and investment that has been made at Andel Plastics within the last year. We are all aware of the pressures on manufacturing costs and media focus on plastic components and recycling. This year has seen the development within Andel of more automated closed loop systems, that enable automatic sprue trimming (the waste product) and then recycling of this within a closed loop system. Ensuring an efficient and cost effective component for our customers whilst being environmentally focussed.

We are so proud of both these nominations and the finalist position, reflecting the investment that we have made in equipment, training and people.

If you would like to learn more about the services that Andel Plastics can help you with, then please contact us.

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Women in Plastics panel discussion

andel_user — Fri, 21 Jun 2024 09:48:42 +0000

A blog extract from Helena Flowers – Business Owner and Managing Director

On Wednesday I visited the Med-tech Online show at the NEC to take part in a panel discussion on Women in Plastics, organised by Leanne Taylor, with two other ladies from the industry, Rebecca Smith, National Territories Manager from Connect 2 Cleanrooms and Dr Artemis Stamboulis Senior Lecturer in Biomaterials and Nanomaterials from the University of Birmingham.

Being on public view and speaking to an audience is totally out of my comfort zone, so the initial nerves were raging away. You can see me sitting on my hands to try and stop the fidgeting most of the way through!

However, the seats started to fill and there was a good spread male and females. First off we discussed the routes we had taken into the industry and I was saddened by the story of my fellow panellist Dr Artemis Stamboulis, who had trained and prepared to take over her family moulding business. Management instead was given to her male cousins, who hadn’t the relevant experience but were male.

This contrasted with my story, I suppose I was lucky enough to be the only child interested in my family business and my parents shared all their experience to prepare me to take over. I never really thought dad would retire, but he enjoys it now well enough and they both know the business is in safe hands.

After how we all got into our roles, the discussion went on to more serious sharing of experiences about the more subtle ways that men can demonstrate up that we are ‘in the man’s world’ and thought of as not capable of doing the roles we do. Such as Rebecca who has had tape measures removed from her whilst specifying a cleanroom for a client. I’ve certainly been asked, whilst watching a mould trial for a potential machine purchase whether I like the colour of the machine. When I answered yes, I was told that was all I needed to worry about then. These are the things we notice whilst in our roles and I think we smile sweetly and get on with it because we wouldn’t want to make that male feel uncomfortable about their everyday sexism.

Though how will this affect the chances of other females joining the industry? I found the next part of the discussion very interesting, we talked about role models and how to encourage women to apply for positions within the manufacturing and plastics industry in general. It seemed to be that it was more likely when there was a female leader in a role, that they would attract and support more females. So could the answer be, we need more female leaders? I personally don’t believe that the positive discrimination of women to fulfil a male to female quota is helpful, in fact it can be more damaging to the opportunities of women than at first thought. Certainly I have experience within BP, where it was decided they needed to actively place Female area managers of engineering functions. BP reshuffled the business and suddenly there were Female managers, but they weren’t there by merit, they were there to fulfil a quota so they didn’t the relevant experience and expertise, ultimately most of them failed. Giving credence to the perception that women weren’t suitable for this industry, ‘we told you so when you recruited her it’s a man’s job’, type mentality.

However, had they done it the proper way (which would have taken more time admittedly), and recruited females at the lower levels, engineers, sales people, lab technicians then supported trained them up through the ranks over time. They would have found the right females for the managerial roles and they would likely still be there and able to influence from the inside. It wouldn’t have been overnight like the positive recruitment did, but we are battling a long held belief that women are the homemakers and the men are the breadwinners. It would have been a longer lasting approach.

Back to the homemakers comment, this was also covered in the discussion around women and dare I said the word, babies. As the owner of a business, I know you cannot take into account when recruiting whether someone is of child bearing age or soon to be. However, we women who have applied for jobs between our 20’s and 30’s all know that it is considered, even if unconsciously. It was great to hear that Connect 2 Cleanrooms allow flexibility for their workforce around their children, both male and female. As a family business I know we do as much as we can to be flexible, because we don’t want to lose the experience of people due to not being willing to work around family requirements. The discussion highlighted the fact that we all felt that businesses should be as flexible as possible to accommodate growing families, enabling both parents to take part in important things, like the Sports day or Christmas Nativity. We all felt this could not only be driven by us, as female leaders, but by men. The majority of families these days have both working parents, so it is the interest of the fathers to speak up and be positive if a female colleague is a mother is maybe being held back for promotion or penalised in another way because they are a parent. After all we have single parent fathers these days and fathers who do want to pick the kids up from school or care for them when they are poorly, so just as we shouldn’t penalise the mothers, the fathers shouldn’t be either.

The next part of the discussion revolved around the million dollar question, how do we get more females into the industry. How to we encourage them that actually, manufacturing / plastics / medical research is a suitable career that they can excel at.

Well we all felt that first off we need to encourage a change at school level, when we have these choices of subjects, Maths, Biology, Physics, we need to talk about how those subjects can be applied. I know when I was at school, the boys did metalwork the girls did home economics, I hope it isn’t like that these days, Andel Plastics sponsor the Race for the Line competition in the knowledge that all the year sevens, boys and girls get the same chance to design and rocket propel a car!

Back to the point… when we get to careers advice, and a female says I am good at maths, in times gone by they might have been suggested, book-keeping, cashiering at a bank. These days I would hope the bar is raised to accountants, bank managers and financial advisors, but even then, why not engineering? If you can work to two decimal points of a millimetre, or work out a compound angle, why not architect, or toolmaker, Aircraft engineer. I strongly believe it is these conversations that will benefit our girls most for the future. How can you apply the skills you have and enjoy using to the full market sector with no boundaries.

Which brings me nicely I suppose to my last point, one which I didn’t get to make in full at the discussion.

Why was I the child that went into the family manufacturing business? there were four kids, my sister went into video conferencing, my elder brother onto become CEO of large London banking firms and my little brother into Computer programming. I used to think it was because I was a daddy’s girl, but actually I was also a mommy’s girl. My father was the toolmaker, my mother the artist. So if someone hung a picture off kilter it drove me mad, but likewise if that picture wasn’t a good one? Brain overload.

However, I wasn’t a tom boy, which I think a lot of people believe a female must have been to end up in an otherwise male dominated area. Yes my dad taught me to carve wood and my older brother taught me how to weld and strip an engine, but likewise me and my brother used to make cakes every weekend and my mom taught us to sew and knit. I do believe it was in my upbringing, there was no male and female jobs or hobbies, no boundaries on that.

So we need to break this perception that, for example if you are interested in aerospace engineering or manufacturing that you must be a tomboy and are somehow less than female. Likewise I think the media can help us out with the way they word some of their otherwise inspirational stories about women rising to the top of their profession in a male dominated area. You will often find in articles wording such as, she ‘fought to the top’ she ‘battled her way’ we need to alter these phrases to ‘she developed her skills, she won an award, she earned a promotion.’ We don’t want to discourage female applications because they think it is going to be a long hard slog to get to the same level of a man. It may very well be, but let us not put them off trying. Too often it can be perceived that you have to be battle hardened to get where you want to get, that if you like stereotypical male dominated roles you must be a tomboy with all those connotations. Let’s try and change that perception, let us encourage the females of the world to consider all the ranges of careers available to them and go for the one they are passionate about. To have the courage to back themselves despite whatever odds they think are against them and don’t give up. Finally, if they need help, let’s hope they find initiatives like Women in Plastics and make contact and get some advice and support. Afterall, that’s why we started the conversation.

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Woman Who Achieves Award

andel_user — Fri, 21 Jun 2024 09:47:02 +0000

On Friday 7th June, Andel Plastics Managing Director and owner attended the Woman Who Achieves Award ceremony as a finalist in two categories.

It is our pleasure to announce that she won the award in the category for Woman Who Achieves and Innovates through STEM.

It is the fourth year for the Woman Who Achieves Awards, in partnership with the FSB. The awards and network celebrate women in business, with an aim to support each other and create role models and remove boundaries.

Helena was entered into two categories for Innovates through STEM and Outstanding Leadership. Those who know Helena, know that she is passionate about sharing her experiences and inspiring and supporting the younger generation into engineering. The week before the ceremony, Helena had taken part in a panel discussion at the Med-tech show regarding this subject with Women in Plastics

About the award ceremony Helena said “When Sandra (Garlick, Awards organiser) started to describe the winner, I knew it was me. I was so shocked I could hardly speak when picking up the award.” “It was such a surprise. I’d never been to a Woman Who Achieves event before and I had soon realised the calibre of women in the room when I arrived. I decided pretty quickly that I’d been lucky to get into the finals and relaxed into lunch. When my name was read out I was just stunned.”

“Now it has sunk it a bit more, I realise what an achievement this was, all the finalists and their business journies are different and similar in so many ways. I know now why the network is so important and Sandra does such an amazing job to put it all together. I came away from the day feeling even more inspired.”

Andel Plastics are injection moulders and toolmakers, with a class 7 cleanroom. Helena is the second generation owner, having been in the business for 22 years herself. Supplying a wide range of industries and from start-up businesses to multinationals, please contact us if you have any reqirements for our services.

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Andel open for NHS business

andel_user — Fri, 21 Jun 2024 09:40:45 +0000

Andel Plastics have been able to remain open during the Covid-19 lockdown. Having a toolroom in-house in the UK has been a massive advantage and the toolmaker team have pulled out all the stops for NHS tooling and moulding to help in the fight.

Andel are still working to prioritise tooling for the NHS and have capacity to spare.

Working with a introduction from Warwick Manufacturing Group, Andel Plastics designed and manufactured a two impression tool to increase testing. Within two days Andel had designed and moulded samples for Total Precision in Derbyshire. Samples were tested and approved by Chesterfield Hospital. A total turnaround from enquiry to product supply of two weeks.

Total Precision admittedly usually purchase their injection mould tooling from China, which was why they approached WMG for a recommendation of a UK based toolmaker. After this first project Andel and Total worked together on a face visor injection mould tool, which Andel manufactured in just 8 days. Enabling Total Precision to start moulding a 40’000 order of Face Visor frames for Liniar to put together and distribute nationwide.

Face Visor mouldflow

Managing Director Helena Flowers commented that she hoped this was the start of a future partnership, with Total sourcing injection mould tools from Andel and the UK. ‘What we have shown, I hope is that we the UK can compete on timescales and price. With the added bonus of a secure supply chain, the same time zones and quality products.” A lot has changed in UK manufacturing in the last ten years we have had to be innovative and competitive whilst keeping the Great British Quality customers expect. Hopefully, almost being forced to test us out, has shown new customers that we can meet their expectations and possibly exceed it too.

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Helena Flowers podcast alongside Sir Andrew Strauss.

andel_user — Fri, 21 Jun 2024 09:29:14 +0000

Managing Director Helena Flowers was invited onto an episode of The Leaders Council podcast, which included an interview with her cricketing hero Sir Andrew Strauss.

The Leaders Council of Great Britain and Northern Ireland is currently in the process of talking to leadership figures from across the nation in an attempt to understand this universal trait.

During the podcast Host Scott Challinor asked both guests a series of questions about leadership and the role it has played in their careers to date.

During the podcast Helena shared her experiences during the Coronavirus pandemic and how leadership has featured during the crisis, whilst the business has adjusted.

Sir Strauss discussed his cricketing career, being Skipper for England through to the foundation in honour of his late wife, with insights into turning cricket Red for Ruth. https://ruthstraussfoundation.com

Scott Challinor commented, ‘Hosting a show like this, where you speak to genuine leaders who have been there and done it, either on a national stage or within a crucial industry sector, is an absolute honour.’

Lord Blunkett, chairman of The Leaders Council of Great Britain and Northern Ireland said, ‘I think the most informative element of each episode is the first part, where Scott Challinor is able to sit down with someone who really gets how their industry works and knows how to make their organisation tick. Someone who’s there day in day out working hard and inspiring others. That’s what leadership is all about.’

You can listen to the podcast in full here: https://youtu.be/uTLmR7SgEy4

You can also discover more about Helena Flowers here:

http://www.leaderscouncil.co.uk/members/helena-flowers

To find out more about what Andel Plastics has been doing to help the NHS during the crisis… read more

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Leadership in time of Covid Andel Plastics

andel_user — Fri, 21 Jun 2024 09:26:24 +0000

Helena Flowers in discussion with other business leaders on how they have faced the leadership challenge in the time of Covid.

As a member of Made in the Midlands group, Managing Director Helena Flowers was invited to share her experiences of steering her business through the challenges of a Global Pandemic.

Helena recently took part in the Leaders Council Podcast, with guest Sir Andrew Strauss, so this discussion was a chance to share experiences with other business leaders and compare notes.

Helena was keen to share positivity, with Andel Plastics having been able to work all through the Lockdown period. Andel Plastics has actually achieved it’s best ever month in 45 years of trading in September of this year.

“more and more we are seeing businesses wanting to secure their supply chain in the domestic market. Reshoring production, or taking the opportunity to redesign products by using more modern methods and provide cost savings.

Hopefully, we will see the tide turning on thinking abroad means cheaper.”

Helena went on to explain that ‘UK manufacturers have HAD to adapt over the past decade to be able to respond quicker, more cost effectively adding value to their whole service proposition. ‘

With Covid almost forcing OEM’s to test the UK market, I think they have experience that in fact the domestic market can compete on so many levels and often cases offer much more. Working on the same time zones, to standardised Quality systems and HSE safe working environments.

Having your whole supply chain being UK based, gives reassurance of service and quality that more consumers and businesses demand. Giving extra benefits of reduced environmental impact for travel and shipment, but also the timescale involved these.

Helena emphasised

I believe that this is an opportunity for UK manufacturers to showcase the investment and innovation we have done in recent years to show we can compete. We can provide a full and better service as we lead the innovations not follow it. When all aspects are considered, the domestic market has to be the way forward, to secure supply chains, ensure the UK economy bounces back and protect the planet from unnecessary travel”

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SME Focus Episode Fourteen: Andel Plastics

andel_user — Fri, 21 Jun 2024 07:07:10 +0000

SMEFocus is the new programme that showcases the UK’s brilliant SMEs. Made for manufacturers, by manufacturers. Chris Greenough hosts this weekly show, and is Chief Commercial Officer of Shrewsbury-based SDE Technology, one of the leading manufacturers of pressings and assemblies in the UK.

Chris has championed the British manufacturing sector for more than two decades, particularly SMEs. Here he is hosting this innovative weekly discussion programme brought you by FactoryNOW TV, MTD and Jefferson.

The week’s show features Helena Flowers, Managing Director at Andel Plastics. Discussing the challenges and positivity of the last year in her business. UK based toolroom and reshoring, along with product design and development.

Full article & video: https://www.mtdmfg.com/videos/sme-focus-episode-fourteen-andel-plastics/

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3D printed mould tooling

andel_user — Fri, 21 Jun 2024 07:04:44 +0000

Andel Plastics has launched a new service to produce 3D printed injection mould tooling, using latest additive manufacturing techniques.

Andel is well renown for it’s design services for component improvement and manufacture. With a 3D printing and prototyping service Andel is able to offer the adjustments to CAD models that would improve components. Potentially also reducing tooling and moulding costs for the whole project being able to supply 3D printed physical prototype for testing and assessment. However, Andel can now also offer 3D printed injection mould tooling for prototype projects (design complexity dependant). This 3D printed tooling has proven capable of moulding a minimum of 1000 parts for proof of concept purposes*. Tooling is made in steel and can offer conformal cooling etc that is not available with the traditional tooling manufacture techniques.

With more funding available to entrepreneurs within the UK to keep manufacturing and production on shore, this is a great addition to Andel Plastics’s already extensive services on offer. They can now take a customer on the journey from concept, design, 3D prototype printing products, to 3D printed mould tool. Taking them then onto fully hardened tooling and production moulding capability. Andel Plastic’s also offer a Cleanroom packaging service, ultrasonic welding service and small assembly service. Later this year they will add the newest service to their range of colour printing onto plastic products. Making them one of the leading Injection moulding service provider

*some nylon filled materials may reduce this

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Collaboration leads to finalist status

andel_user — Fri, 21 Jun 2024 07:02:15 +0000

Andel Plastics are delighted to announce that they have achieved Finalist status in the prestigious Plastic Industry Awards. Having previously been winners in other categories, this is the first time for the category of Supplier Partnership of Toolmaker.

The collaboration with No Fuss Fill began during Covid lockdown, when WMG had to close its doors on projects. Having been recommended, Andel Plastics were able to assist with further refinement and improvements to the design. Both to improve the product and give a better all round cost effective solution. It was very important to No Fuss Fill, that the device be made in the UK. With its own toolroom in Tyseley, Birmingham, Andel Plastics were able to fulfil that criteria and be a complete solution.

Tooling was manufactured in house for all components, some of which were fortunate enough to fit into a set of standard insert sizes. These provides customers with more cost effective tooling by utilising a standard bolster that Andel offers to its customers wherever possible.

Whereas the award is for the toolmaking partnership, the No Fuss Fill device is injection moulded by Andel Plastics. Assembly, labelling and packaging is also done on site so that the finished product arrives with No Fuss Fill for customers.

Managing Director Helena Flowers said, “it is thankfully an increasing trend for entrepreneurs to want their designed products manufactured in the UK, with all the Quality that a British made product gives. Reduction in carbon footprint due to the whole product being produced on one local site. Working on this project with a fellow winner of a Woman Who Achieves Award has been a delight. With the added bonus of a potential award winning partnership as well, that is very special. “

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