Annah Poteat travels across North Carolina (U.S.) helping manufacturing facilities increase their efficiency through N.C. State University’s Industrial Extension Service. She’s a specialist in Lean Manufacturing Technique.

The basic concept of lean manufacturing is to reduce the inherent waste in the manufacturing process by lessening the downtime that a product spends between stages of manufacture.

With a grant from the state’s Workforce Development Board, Poteat’s assignment was to apply these principles to Asheville’s Industries for the Blind facility, (I.F.B.) where 40 blind employees produce goods like poncho liners, kit bags and T-shirts for the U.S. military.

Poteat found a sense of camaraderie, dedication and teamwork at the unit. Eighty percent of I.F.B.’s workers never had a chance to work before, so they value their work and independence in a way that sighted people often take for granted.

Earlier, a poncho liner used to spend 8 1/2 hours in production. Now it takes just 90 minutes from start to finish. What’s more, the new system uses a lot space. I.F.B. now produces 600 liners a day. The blind workers rapidly replace bobbins, needles, and perform routine maintenance acts, multiple times per shift.

Philip Abernethy stitches synthetic, moisture-wicking T-shirts. He lays the fabric against metal bars in front of his modified sewing machine to precisely measure the length from collar to sleeve. “It’s tactile, so I don’t have to use a ruler or tape,” Abernethy explained.

“We strategised how to set this up, and then we kept re-evaluating the flow,” he adds. “We’re not wasting our time making a shirt that won’t pass the final screening process.”