QualPro

QualPro was founded in 1982 by Dr. Charles Holland.{{cite news|date=July 21, 2002|url=http://www.businessweek.com/stories/2002-07-21/q-and-a-finding-a-better-way-to-make-anything|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121018035206/http://www.businessweek.com/stories/2002-07-21/q-and-a-finding-a-better-way-to-make-anything|url-status=dead|archive-date=October 18, 2012|access-date=March 12, 2013|title=Q&A: Finding a Better Way to Make Anything|newspaper=BusinessWeek}} Holland previously worked for Union Carbide in the 1960s and 1970s at the Y-12 National Security Complex. They were producing carbon foam used in atomic bombs for the Atomic Energy Commission. 85 percent of the foam was defective and they were considering re-tooling the factory at a cost of $100 million. Instead, Holland questioned the workers and management team for ideas on how to decrease defects and tested 15 factors like the size and position of mixing blades. Holland’s multivariable experiments were based on the 1935 book The Design of Experiments and the work of two British statisticians that used multivariable testing to make better shells to shoot down German planes in World War II.{{cite news|date=May 23, 2005|first=Jon|last=Van|title=Statistical method helps boost bottom lines, batting averages|access-date=March 13, 2013|url=https://www.chicagotribune.com/2005/05/23/statistical-method-helps-boost-bottom-lines-batting-averages/|newspaper=Chicago Tribune}} The success rate of foam production increased from 15 percent to 60 percent, and eventually to 99 percent.

Holland published a paper on the topic, but according to Forbes, at first it went "largely unnoticed." He started helping Edwards Deming run four-day seminars on statistics in quality manufacturing.{{cite news|title=Boost in Business May Mean (ugh) Statistics|first=Helen|last=Pike|newspaper=The Christian Science Monitor|date=December 29, 1993|access-date=March 13, 2013|url=http://www.csmonitor.com/1993/1229/29101.html}} Deming was influential in the quality manufacturing movement, in particular among Japanese auto manufacturers.{{cite news|first=John|last=Zmirak|title=Productivity Blitz|newspaper=Success Magazine|year=1997}} Deming urged Holland to start QualPro. Most of its first clients, such as Ford and Procter & Gamble, were referred to Holland from Deming.

The firm's early work was primarily for manufacturing companies.{{cite news|title=The numbers man|url=http://www.economist.com/node/170880|newspaper=The Economist|date=August 6, 1998|access-date=March 13, 2013}} It expanded into marketing and advertising, healthcare and government in the 1990s. As of 2005, 60 percent of its clients were in service industries.

QualPro is a management consulting firm focused on implementing multivariable testing (MVT), a technique for designing experiments that test multiple variables simultaneously.{{cite news|newspaper=The Wall Street Journal|first=James|last=Hagerty|title=Home-Improvement Chain Puts Science to Work on its Marketing}}{{cite news|title=We want our MVT!|url=http://www.industrytoday.com/article_view.asp?ArticleID=F377|volume=15|issue = 1|access-date=March 13, 2013|first=Rita|last=Koselka|newspaper=Industry Today}} QualPro uses it to test a large number of ideas on how to improve business processes or performance at the same time and to see how those ideas effect each other in different combinations.

The firm collects ideas from a client’s executives, front-line workers, or other departments and staff. The ideas are culled through based on three criterion: they must be cost-free, easy to try and something that can be done quickly. The remaining ideas are tested by statisticians in phases to find out which ideas have a positive impact on the output and which combinations of ideas have a greater effect. Out of 150,000 ideas that have been tested by QualPro, 53 percent have no significant impact, 22 percent make things worse and 25 percent result in improvements.{{cite news|newspaper=Financial Executive|date=April 2005|title=Consultant Scores with Mathematical Modeling|url=http://www.thefreelibrary.com/Consultant+scores+with+mathematical+modeling.-a0144751746|access-date=March 13, 2013|first=Jeffrey|last=Marshall}}Peak, M. H. (1993). RESULTS GUARANTEED, OR YOUR MONEY BACK. Management Review, 82(1), 11.{{cite news|title=Shaking up Old Quality Improvement Ideas|first=Doug|last=Smith|url=http://nl.newsbank.com/nl-search/we/Archives?p_product=CO&s_site=charlotte&p_multi=CO&p_theme=realcities&p_action=search&p_maxdocs=200&p_topdoc=1&p_text_direct-0=0F244B689132081C&p_field_direct-0=document_id&p_perpage=10&p_sort=YMD_date:D&s_trackval=GooglePM

|date=February 4, 1991|access-date=March 13, 2013|pp=2D|newspaper=Charlotte Observer}}

Some of QualPro's clients include DuPont, Williams-Sonoma, Inc., Allstate, Big Lots and AT&T.{{cite news|newspaper=News Sentinel|first=Larisa|last=Brass|title=QualPro finds new niche|date=August 11, 2010}}{{cite news|first=Rebecca|last=Reisner|date=March 17, 2009|title=QualPro's Democratic Management Consulting|url=http://www.businessweek.com/managing/content/mar2009/ca20090317_303075.htm|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110418123401/http://www.businessweek.com/managing/content/mar2009/ca20090317_303075.htm|url-status=dead|archive-date=April 18, 2011|newspaper=BusinessWeek}}{{cite news|title=Rapid Adjustment|newspaper=ChemicalWeek|date=September 30, 1998|url=http://connection.ebscohost.com/c/articles/1142890/rapid-adjustment|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141224030309/http://connection.ebscohost.com/c/articles/1142890/rapid-adjustment|url-status=dead|archive-date=December 24, 2014|access-date=March 13, 2013}} In 1996, QualPro conducted experiments for the National Enquirer to determine how 20 variables related to its cover, news-stand and in-store promotions effected sales.{{cite news|last=Pogrebin|first=Robin|title=MEDIA: PUBLISHING; The National Enquirer turns to a consultant to improve its sales at supermarkets.|work=The New York Times|page=11|date=October 20, 1997|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1997/10/20/business/media-publishing-national-enquirer-turns-consultant-improve-its-sales.html}} The firm tested 29 variables in Lowe's' newspaper inserts and 36 different versions of the insert's cover-page. They found that Lowe's could increase sales by featuring half as many products on the cover and that it could reduce the number of pages from 72 to 48 without an impact on sales.{{cite news|first=Dale|last=Dauten|date=November 5, 2006|title=A measure of leadership: keep trying|access-date=March 13, 2013|url=http://www.boston.com/jobs/news/articles/2006/11/05/a_measure_of_leadership_keep_trying/|newspaper=The Boston Globe}} For AutoNation, the company tested 30 variables to improve the effectiveness of ads for local dealerships and found that the size of the ad and whether it was in color had no effect on its effectiveness, despite increased costs.{{cite news|last=Chang|first=Kenneth|title=Enlisting Science's Lessons to Entice More Shoppers to Spend More|work=The New York Times|page=3|date=September 19, 2006|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2006/09/19/science/19sell.html}}

With help from QualPro, Boise Cascade discovered there was no connection between the quality of wood they purchased as raw material and the quality of wood pulp it produced for paper and packaging products.{{cite news|title=Night in the wood yard opens eyes, saves millions|newspaper=USA Today|first=Paul|last=Wiseman}} QualPro worked with Elo TouchSystems to find out why 25 percent of the touch-screens they manufactured had bubbles between the screen and coating. Statisticians identified three causes, which reduced the defects to less than 1 percent: the type of polyester, the coversheet shaping process and the type of adhesives used.{{cite news|title=The New Mantra: MVT|first=Rita|last=Koselka|newspaper=Forbes}} A Unifi yarn plant worked with QualPro to identify ways to reduce the number of broken yarns. Out of the 25 quality improvement ideas Unifi had, testing found that five were effective.{{cite news|newspaper=The Wall Street Journal|title=Boosting Productivity through Statistical Experiments|url=https://blogs.wsj.com/economics/2010/05/05/boosting-productivity-through-statistical-experiments/|first=Justin|last=Lahart|access-date=March 12, 2013}}{{cite news|first=Mike|last=Schmidt|newspaper=Manufacturing Business Technology|url=http://www.mbtmag.com/articles/2012/03/putting-processes-test|date=March 2, 2012|access-date=March 13, 2013|title=Putting Processes to the Test}}

• {{cite book|author=Charles W. Holland|title=Breakthrough Business Results With MVT: A Fast, Cost-Free "Secret Weapon" for Boosting Sales, Cutting Expenses, and Improving Any Business Process|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=eft_wplFTk4C|access-date=March 13, 2013|date=April 1, 2005|publisher=John Wiley & Sons|isbn=978-0-471-73345-4}}
• {{cite news|newspaper=PaperAge|title=Multivariable Testing|url=http://www.qualproinc.com/library/PaperAgeJune2010_1280765453.pdf|date=May–June 2010|access-date=March 13, 2013|first=John|last=O'Brien}}

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• [http://www.qualproinc.com/ Official Website]

Category:Companies based in Knoxville, Tennessee

Category:American management consultants