Quality VS Speed

[mptjelgin]

1 hour ago, NCMEDIC said:

It isn't JUST the name.   The fact is that the shell of an Airstream will outlast almost anything else on the road.  There is no rusting, and no delamination of the shell (frame is a different story). 

Properly maintained, it is quite feasible to expect 30 years plus of service.   That isn't always the case with RV's constructed using "more modern" materials.   Yes, we make compromises in terms of space to get what we perceive as a longer lasting unit.

To each their own.   Happy travels!

By "name" I meant brand.  No offense intended. 

[NCMEDIC]

LOL.   Absolutely no offense taken.   We have had several different brands, and each and every one of them is a compromise.

[Kirk W]

8 hours ago, NCMEDIC said:

It isn't JUST the name.   The fact is that the shell of an Airstream will outlast almost anything else on the road.  There is no rusting, and no delamination of the shell (frame is a different story). 

Quote

Airstream Flying Cloud 19' + 20'

starting at $63,900

 

Possibly true, but with a price of $63,900, I could buy a new 19' KZ-Sportsman every 10 years, even allowing for inflation and still have money left over when I was finished. I bought the one that we presently travel in new, just 4 years ago and I paid $12,000 in total including tax, title, and licensing. And my Sportsman has more headroom and even has storage cabinets above due to the difference in shape. Or you can compare the 17' Sport at $45,900 to the 17' Casita at $21,000. 

[NCMEDIC]

Casitas are very nice as well.    I'm just done with rubber roofs and I don't care for slides.

[Kirk W]

4 hours ago, NCMEDIC said:

  I'm just done with rubber roofs and I don't care for slides.

My Sportsman has neither. 

[noteven]

I'm looking forward to when Science invents waterproof glue so RV Industry can use it to make laminated oufits that sit out in the rain. 

[Alie&Jim's Carrilite]

22 hours ago, noteven said:

I'm looking forward to when Science invents waterproof glue so RV Industry can use it to make laminated oufits that sit out in the rain. 

They already do..... It just can't be applied correctly by the worker who has to meet his quota for the day...

[mds1]

When we toured the factory at Augusta RV last year I found out they pay their workers by the hour. According to the company representative we visited with, Augusta sometimes has a hard time finding employees at an hourly rate because the piece workers earn more.  After reading the Reuters article I'm now wondering what percentage of Augusta's employees are those that no longer want the stress on their bodies. And if those are the more experienced employees?  The company representative we met with said she had worked for one of those companies (Forest River) who paid by the piece and she was glad to be away from it. On a side note, the representative said they have a check list as the unit is built so they know which employee installed what in the event of issues.  They encourage employees to take the time to build it correctly. Not sure if that is working out for them or not.

I understand New Horizons pays by the hour as well. 

The article mentions a move by LCI away from work paid by the piece:

"Southern’s employer, LCI, is one of the industry players taking steps to try to make the work more appealing. Nick Fletcher, chief human resources officer, says when he arrived four years ago, turnover at the company was over 100 percent. It’s now less than 40 percent, and he expects it to continue falling. Fletcher has been on a campaign to end the piece rate system, which “doesn’t incentivize workers to be safe or produce high quality,” he says. More than 75 percent of the company’s workers are now on fixed hourly pay, averaging about $17.50, he says."

 

LCI is Lippert is it not?  I understand Lippert owns a lot of the patents in the RV industry. Now I'm wondering how many of their parts, to include frames, are now being built by hourly employees.  Maybe an employee at an RV assembly plant can now more easily move to an hourly job with a parts vendor. That would create more competition for employees and maybe force employers into better working conditions. This all starts with the top management.  One has to wonder where their hearts are at. It would be easy to assume they are just after profit. They sure switch out key management a lot it seems. Especially as relatively speaking, these RV companies are not old. An example are the Keystone founders who left to create Grand Design only to sell out to Winnebago a short time later. 

They can build a better product at a lower cost. They just have to think it's important. Dr. Deming showed the Japanese how to do it after World War II in the auto industry. That forced the US auto industry to change their ways. Quality is Job One - that's the logo Ford Motor came up with after Deming turned them around. Quality means striving for zero imperfections and eliminating waste, especially employees time rebuilding something that is faulty. The concept may go against the ways of some executives who seem to care less. That may hurt their long-term survivability. 

Really an interesting article despite the political points. Thank you to the original poster for letting us know about it.

[Lou Schneider]

Back in the 1960s, my family was driving through Morgan Hill, CA on our way to a Disneyland vacation, towing our new Aristocrat travel trailer.

Halfway through town, we were flagged down by a man who was honking his horn and pointing at the trailer.  Fearing the worst, we pulled over to see what was wrong.  He introduced himself as Irv Perch, president and founder of Aristocrat.

He pointed out a minor flaw in the assembly of the trailer's siding that we hadn't even noticed, and asked if we would follow him to the nearby factory so they could fix the defect.  When my father demurred, saying we were on a limited time vacation, he offered to pay for our lunch at a nearby restaurant while we waited.

We followed him to the factory and he led us past the service building to the assembly line and directed us to leave the trailer there.   Then he went inside and grabbed a couple of workers off of the line, brought them outside and directed them to fix their defective work.  It involved removing the lower third of the trailer's siding, fixing the questionable joint, then reassembling it.

Aristocrat eventually folded, some of it's management and workers later formed Auto Mate, a manufacturer of high quality 5th wheel trailers.

 

 

 

[mds1]

Awesome story Lou! 

Wonder why the company folded?  I'm going to look that up.  Suppose the values after the owner left did not continue on.  -

 

Update: Found this article on Mr. Perch and many others.  Founder of what became the world's largest RV company. According to the article. They eventually sold the business to another it would appear.