SunFrog Trains 30 Employees Thanks to Skilled Trades Training Award
SunFrog, a key employer in Gaylord, has experienced rapid growth in both revenue and jobs over the past 3 years. Their impact on the local community and economy is strong, and they have plans to move to a new facility within a couple years, hoping to hire on many new positions. In the last year, they’ve had 125 new hires, with Michigan Works! assisting with recruitment and job readiness workshops. SunFrog participates in the Michigan Works! annual career fairs and continually uses Mitalent.org to post job openings. They’ve also participated in on-the-job training programs through Michigan Works! Through support from Michigan Works!, local economic developers, and local governments, SunFrog has been able to attract, develop and assist employees in progressing their skills, careers and wages.
To ensure SunFrog maintains its’ competitive edge in the highly competitive global online retail apparel marketing and printing services, it is critical they continue to develop their employee's skills. That’s why SunFrog is committed to developing the skills of their employees, retaining a skilled workforce and continuing expansion of their product lines and market share. Thanks to the Skilled Trade Training Funds that were awarded to SunFrog with the help of Michigan Works! Northeast Consortium, they can pursue training opportunities that may not have been considered otherwise.
With the 2017 STTF Award, SunFrog received $19,835 to train 30 existing employees and hire/train 1 new employee. Trainees varied from production supervision/management to senior leadership.
“We've benefited from the lean training greatly,” reports John Sewell, SunFrog Production Process Manager. “It opened our eyes to processes that we had that were on the right track for lean and helped us further improve them. We were also able to decrease a lot of wasted inventory in stock of products and supplies, as well as organized in 5s different areas around the shop four more visual cues when something is out of place or missing.”
Maintenance Manager Zach Tallent agrees, “Lean training has helped us become more organized, improving our overall efficiency.”