You know from experience how easy it is for an industrial project to expand in size, schedule, and scope. Small overruns in time and cost can quickly snowball. Before you know it, your project is off-schedule and over budget. If the project is small, these issues may not have much impact. If it’s a large project, it could threaten your business’s stability and cash flow.
There may be no project larger in scope than an industrial plant relocation. You have to move every item in your building, including inventory, shelving, office furniture, machinery, and more, to a new building. And you have to do so with minimal damage or defects and little impact to your production schedule. It’s a difficult challenge.
Many industrial companies attempt to manage their relocation in house. They use their internal project managers to develop timelines, hire contractors, and oversee the execution. However, that may not be the wisest strategy. A plant relocation is unlike any other type of project. If you don’t have experience with relocation, you could easily miss potential risks and run into serious challenges.
Instead, consider hiring an outside industrial plant relocation consultant. They can serve as your partner to keep the project on track and on budget. Not sure whether an outside consultant is right for you? Below are three ways in which you can benefit from a plant relocation consultant’s services:
A plant relocation isn’t as simple as transporting furniture and equipment from one building to another. There are a wide range of issues that could arise, and often, these issues aren’t discovered until the relocation is well underway.
For example, the concrete floors in your new facility may not be strong enough to support certain machinery. Your bay doors or aisles may not be wide enough to accommodate forklifts. The transport route may have narrow roads or short underpasses. You may need special clearances to transport large machinery through certain states or counties. You may find that some machinery need substantial maintenance before they can be moved.
This is just a small sampling of some of the issues we’ve seen during plant relocations. An outside plant relocation consultation can help you identify the specific risks and potential problems that you could face during your relocation. They can then implement a plan to minimize risks and improve your odds for success.
It’s not difficult for schedule and cost overruns to compound. Even small delays can balloon into big problems. The best way to minimize these issues is to implement a detailed project timeline and then closely monitor that timeline so you can quickly address issues before they swell into bigger challenges.
Unfortunately, an internal project management team may not have the resources or bandwidth to closely manage every step in a relocation. They may have to split attention between the relocation project and their other, regular obligations.
An outside plant relocation consultant is onsite to focus all their energy and resources on your move. They can keep a close eye on the timeline to keep all the moving parts on schedule. If a delay or issue arises, they can take fast action to resolve it.
Even though your relocation may consume much of your energy and focus, you still have a business to run. You may have work in production and shipments in transit. Your customers may have concerns about how the relocation will impact their orders. You can’t abandon those obligations to work on the plant relocation.
A plant relocation consultant gives you the ability and freedom to focus on other priorities. The plant relocation partner manages the planning of the move and the entire process so you can continue to serve your customers. Then, when the new facility is ready, you can hit the ground running without seeing a pause in production or service.
Your plant relocation is too important to undertake alone. Talk to a plant relocation consultant about how they can help you minimize risks, hit your timeline, and improve your odds for success.