Case study
RICOH CORNER POST EXTENSION
Ricoh UK Products Limited receives shipments of photocopiers produced by its sister business in Japan. The Telford plant adapts and configures these for the European market.
Ricoh operates a global environmental policy which includes, where possible, re-use of all packaging materials.
The modification undertaken at Telford increases the height of the Japanese product and as such the original transit packaging has to be modified to facilitate despatch.
In this circumstance, corner support sections were not of sufficient length to support the new height dimension of the finished copier. To source a replacement of appropriate height would have been costly and wasteful of the perfectly serviceable original post. Ricoh then considered the development of an extension piece which could then be fitted to the original post.
Item Products (NPD) Limited was already known to Ricoh as a designer and producer of innovative products for the packaging industry and was invited to present concepts for commercial, practical and environmental consideration.
Item Products were also prepared to work in accordance with the internationally applied Ricoh Green Procurement Policy and support the development by working within the confines of the environmental management system. The intention was to produce a component fit for purpose using materials of minimal environmental impact.
Product design began with existing Item Products components, which had been developed as solutions for associated problems, as a starting point. Two key phases of design resulted in SLA models for full evaluation by Ricoh leading to a decision to commission tooling for the unit, seen in photo, assembled to the original Japanese supporting post.
"For Ricoh, the development of environmental technologies is one of the most important aspects in sustainable environmental management. It is the basis for providing customers with products that simultaneously realise both a reduction in environmental impact and the creation of economic value.
As for our post extensions; jointly developing solutions like these with our suppliers extend the life cycle of our packaging, reduces our waste and saves on purchasing new posts – demonstrating that environmental impact reduction and bottom line benefits are synonymous".
RPL’s Environmental Officer
The post extension, produced from a reprocessed polymer, passed the Ricoh load-bearing tests and was successfully commissioned early 2008.
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