P^e 2
Get
Involved!
By ROBERT GATES
Plant Manager, Kernersville Finishing
Involvement, empowerment, whatever the
phrase, for a business to survive in the 90s, all
employees must be involved.
This involvement can be on the safety com
mittee, the quality teams or project teams. At
Kernersville Finishing we are experimenting with
a team concept for folding.
The project team consists of employees from
pairing and folding working together. As a team
they have designed a work station, experimented
with station set-ups, worked in the module and
evaluated the process.
Also the team has developed questions to ask
employees at other Sara Lee facilities concern
ing the team concept. Through these employ
ees’ efforts a tremendous amount of progress
has been made and continues to move ahead.
As opportunities in your facility come up for
employee involvement, jump in. Adams-Millis
needs input. All of us together can make quality
improvements, safety improvements and prod
uct improvements.
No one person has cornered the market on
new ideas. Everyone can and needs to contrib
ute.
United Way Gift
May 1993
Millises Say Thanks
To Adams-Millis Family
The United Way of Greater
High Point will move into new
facilities around June 1 thanks
to a $510,000 contribution from
James H. Millis Sr. and his wife
Jesse.
In thanking the Millises for
their gift, United Way Mar
keting and Communications
Director Greg Romeo com-
ented, “The United Way of
Greater High Point is very
appreciative of what they have
done. It not only will give us
better facilities but also greater
visibility in the community. It
also will help us to better serve
the community through our
22 local agencies.”
Romeo said the Millis gift
showed that “they have a lot
of confidence in the United
Way, especially in view of some
of the things that have hap
pened at the national level in
the past year.”
The new United Way of
fices will be located on Church
Avenue in High Point.
Following is a letter from
Jim Millis, Sr. regarding the
gift to United Way:
You got 25 years for a system error?
Finance Performs Vital A-M Function
One department in Adams- lion for utilities and a half Treva Palmer k Ann .
Millis is virtually invisible when
compared to other areas of
the company, yet its role is
vital to the operation of the
company. It’s the Finance De
partment.
“Most people probably take
for granted what the depart
ment does,” said Vice Presi
dent of Finance and Admini
stration Jim Hall. “Three ar
eas that do a tremendous job
behind the scenes are Accounts
Payable, Credit and Payroll.”
Hall added that the depart
ment has maintained a “low
profile” but that is preferred.
“That indicates to me that
they are doing an excellent
job,” Hall said. “If they don’t
do a good job, we would cer
tainly hear about that.”
What they do is handle more
than $200 million a year, dis
bursing much of that to ven
dors and employees and for
taxes, benefits and services.
About $50 million goes to
vendors for yarn and other
materials. Another $30 mil
lion in payroll and $10 million
in employee benefits, $2 mil
lion for utilities and a half Treva Palmer is responsible
million dollars in taxes. for Mount Airy and Kern-
Accounts Payable usually ersville Knitting; Jean Myers
handles more than 5,000 in- for Silver Knit; Betty Seward,
voices a month that come from outside mills and assists in bill-
the company’s 3,000-f active ing department; Mary Bostic,
vendors. The five people who manufacturing support, Kern-
work in that area are respon- ersville Finishing, Annex and
sible for writing an average of
550 checks each week.
“What we do is not hard
but it takes tremendous disci
pline,” said Karen Lisenby,
Accounts Payable manager.
“It can’t be done in a haphaz
ard way.”
John Muller, Director of
Distribution Center; and San
dra Dyer, yarn vendors. High
Point Finishing, Sales and
Marketing and Administration
and Lentz Distribution Cen
ter.
But along with getting bills
paid, it is necessary to make
sure that money is collected
Manufacturing Accounting, from those who buy product
600 new customers (retail find ways to better serve them.”
stores) have been added since Beal said Adams-Millis
October. “wants to be on the top of the
Sporting goods stores are pile with each customer as a
fastest growing group of cus- preferred vendor.” He ex-
tomersforus, Beal explained, plained that during a visit with
Some are small but many are officials of Macy’s the corn-
large chains. ” pany learned that Adams-Millis
Collections may range wasoneofits top five vendors,
widely from day to day from a “They didn’t know that
few thousand dollars to as before,” he said. “It may make
much as $3 million in a day. them look at us even more
“We’ve worked to develop positively in the future.”
a good relationship with our Of course, another major
customers,” Beal noted, “and function of the Finance De-
we re pretty proud of our partment is to handle payroll
record for collections. We for more than 3,000 employ-
agrees
^ from Adams-Millis. That’s the
Our objective is to get our responsibility of Credit Man-
bills paid m a timely manner ager Larry Beal and his staff,
and we don’t want to pay them “After we ship our product
twice,” he said. “So accuracy to the customer, it is then the
is essential. One check may Finance Department’s job to
cover as many 100 invoices.” bill the customer and collect
He said the department payment for the product,” Beal
works to be responsive to the said.
vendors needs. But even before that, the
In the past year. Accounts department makes appropri-
Payable was reorganized to ate credit checks and sets credit
make one person responsible limits for each customer. It has
tor one or two facilities which been a busy time for the de
has proved to be beneficial. partment lately as more than
operate on terms of 30 days
net and our average is about
34 days.”
Citing the payment records
he said most customers pay
ees. Some receive a check while
others are paid electronically
through their bank.
“All employees in our
Barnwell operation are paid
promptly but Beal added that electronically and it is work
in some cases he has heard ing very well,” said Hall. “We
^ The check s in the mail” or hope to do that companywide
Our computer is down ’ on in the future. A check can get
more than one occasion when lost but electronic payment
seeking payment from a cus- doesn’t require a paper trail.”
torner. Finance does prepare a
We visit our customers as printout for the employee list-
part of our commitment to total ing wages, FICA and taxes
customer satisfaction,” he withheld,
added. “By doing that we may
D
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To The Adams-Millis Family,
My wife Jessie and I made a
gift to the United Way to enable
them to purchase a building to
be their new home. We just want
you - all j'otmer and present
employees - to feel a part of
this gift - as it was made with
Sara Lee stock. This is a result
of the success of both Adams-
Millis and Sara Lee and we are
grateful to each of you.
We miss you folks and hope
you and your families are well
and enjoying life.
Sincerely,
Jim Millis, Sr.
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