In 25 years, Garrett Crosby has seen many changes at Tru Vue^® and has contributed to several himself. When he joined the company in 1991, we had just launched Museum Glass® and still relied more heavily on human hands than robots. Today, Tru Vue is an automated operation, but the human touch is still important as we continue to bring innovative new products to the custom framing market.

 

 

Garrett began his career on the production floor where he would load glass. When he switched roles to work as a coater technician, he went to college to get his degree in electrical engineering with the company’s support. This insight into both production and engineering has benefited him throughout his career at Tru Vue.

 

 

In his current role, he helps support yield, quality, and performance issues and improvements, which includes daily reviews of 24-hour production occurrences and assigning teams to address them. One of the areas that he most often works on is the visual inspection systems, a critical part of our focus on quality.

 

 

“The visual inspection systems are the first line of defense in identifying defects,” said Garrett. “We have many of these machines in the building and working with them involves software upgrades and continuous improvement. This technology has definitely helped us become better at quality improvement.”

 

 

Visual inspection systems aren’t the only innovation Garrett has been a part of at Tru Vue. Demand for acrylic products, such as Optium Museum Acrylic®, has increased over the years, and the company has responded with products that offer the best benefits available in glazing.

 

 

“Acrylic substrates are a challenge, but we always seem to come up with an end solution,” he said. “It’s cool to see how far acrylic has come as a product, stemming from continuous improvement, innovations, and doing our best to fulfill customer demand.”

 

 

Another factor that Garrett thinks has been a key in product quality has been the monthly audits.  These audits bring people from different departments together to drive continuous improvement. From both the production and engineering sides, he has experienced two very important aspects of the manufacturing process. He believes that the audits help the two departments understand how important the other is to the process.

 

 

Automation has been one of the biggest changes that Garrett has seen in his time at Tru Vue. The visual inspection systems, along with other automated tools, have reduced errors, streamlined processes, saved time and costs, and have resulted in a very strong safety record.

 

 

“Not a day goes by that we’re not trying to continuously improve something,” said Garrett. “It is part of our culture and has a significant impact on us and our customers.”