ROMAINE ELECTRIC

     
       I decided to write this response to quality control questions 
  raised at the ERA 2005 show in Atlantic City. Every rebuilder has 
  heard from their supplier those words that make their skin crawl 
  and their blood boil. "You are the only one who has reported this 
  problem." I’d like to address this, and at the same time make a 
  point about each businesses responsibility to the market. We have 
  developed parts that are literally the only aftermarket part in 
  the industry that works and is dimensionally correct but customers 
  say "well I'm buying the other guys part, and I agree it's not quite 
  right and yours is better, but I'm not having any problems with 
  their part and most importantly it's cheaper". Case in point, we 
  supply many Rebuilders with armatures. One of our customers was sent 
  a 2003 armature that we had worked very hard to develop. We developed 
  this because the only armature in the market is made incorrectly and 
  takes very creative spacing to use it. This Rebuilder buys the 
  incorrectly designed armature and can get this armature cheaper than 
  what we can offer for the correctly made piece. This Rebuilder 
  acknowledges that ours is made correctly and even performs like OE, 
  but their customers aren’t screaming so they won’t pay a nickel more. 
  Therefore, it must be acknowledged that both Supplier and 
  Rebuilder have equal responsibility in rectifying this very serious 
  issue. QC personnel and departments are very expensive to administer. 
  This cost must be absorbed in selling price. There is no way to 
  circumvent this fact.    
    	
       Quality of product is of paramount importance in our industry. 
  As a force in the marketplace we seek to compete based off supplying 
  a higher quality product, and better services than our competitors. 
  With this in mind, we have elected to maintain and operate three 
  production factories that manufacture, and remanufacture, armatures, 
  rotors, starters, alternators, generators, some stators, and some 
  drives. Using the mechanical expertise gained consistently over time, 
  we generate insight into why a product works well, or does not work 
  well. 

       As is the case with I believe all successful suppliers in our 
  industry, we import high volume merchandise from various countries, 
  to stay competitive in a country where it has become very difficult 
  to profitably conduct manufacturing. We do NOT import products, put 
  them on the shelf, and sell them.  All incoming overseas purchases 
  are given to the QC department and each part number is randomly 
  subjected to a stringent incoming inspection, with various tests 
  performed. Previous to any large order of a product, we require 
  samples from the vendor, that our engineer analyzes. If there is 
  any question in his mind as to whether tolerance are to far out, 
  he takes the product to one of our many long term, highly skilled 
  production workers, where the product is put into it’s environment 
  and tested. In cases where he feels there are metallurgical problems 
  with components, he takes the product to a Boeing materials analysis 
  lab and has a full molecular scan report done. Over 90% of the 
  initial samples sent to us are rejected for various reasons. There 
  are times, where we work with a vendor up to two years, helping them 
  to manufacture a part correctly, before placing a stock order. 
  Some people may contest our practice of teaching overseas companies 
  how to make a high quality product, our view is that they are making 
  it, and selling it to companies here in the USA, and due to the 
  price people will buy it before buying a USA manufactured product, 
  so, our responsibility is to teach them.

       For instance, we manufacture brand new armatures at our factory 
  in Florida; the armatures coming from Atlantic Generator are, bar 
  none, the highest quality product available in the country. In order 
  to make a profit we must get a price in the near $50.00 for a 40MT 
  armature. Very few rebuilders will spend that kind of money for a 
  USA manufactured product. Only the highest quality conscious people 
  - OEM’s, Aircraft, Military companies who sell to large national 
  fleets, etc.- will purchase this grade of product. Therefore we are 
  put in a position, that to a certain marketplace, we must sell 
  overseas purchased product, yet quality must be acceptable.
  
       We have instigated a procedure in which all product quality 
  issues are reported and investigated. If there is a complaint about 
  one of our products, our counter people are trained to contact 
  the QC dept and report the problem. Our people then look at stock 
  and determine if there is a problem. If there is, we check as to 
  when the shipment containing that product came in, and check to 
  see if any other customers have purchased it, and if so, we call 
  them and ask them to return the product. And then we put out a 
  recall notice to our warehouses requiring a stock return.  

       I’d like to mention a point that I heard at the 2005 ERA 
  convention. People were asking that suppliers check their entire 
  incoming product. While we do check all imported product, we do not 
  check all domestically purchased product, and domestic companies 
  do import products that we do not have the time to address. In fact, 
  it would be unreasonable for us to QC our competitors products.  
  We are however a full line supplier, and must make use of every 
  resource we have available, (as all suppliers do) and purchase 
  from other domestic suppliers. All suppliers in the country have 
  similar conversations with our customer bases. Customers tell us 
  that someone else will sell a product a little cheaper, and ask 
  us to reduce our price. Engineers, Quality control people, 
  experienced technicians, these people are not cheap. They cost 
  a lot of money, so much in fact that some suppliers choose not to 
  employ them, simply because competition is driven by our customer 
  base to very low profits for us.  
  
       In this writing, I’ve given an overall review of Romaine’s 
  dedication to QC. Now I’d like to encourage you, that if you want 
  Romaine and other suppliers to be able to do more QC work than we 
  do, buy from your supplier with price being a secondary topic that 
  isn’t addressed if you can take their quality product to the market 
  and sell it priced as is. Allow your first priority considered, in 
  whom to buy from, to be the burning questions that make more 
  difference than price. Is this a high quality product, and do I 
  get top rate service from this supplier?