Spending to train plant
personnel in state-of-the-art use of TQM/Six Sigma quality control and the use of best practices has a
highly positive effect on workmanship, lowers the frequency of equipment breakdowns and work
stoppages, reduces materials waste, helps cut the number of pairs that fail inspection due to
production defects of one kind or another, and promotes smoother overall plant operations. However,
the benefits of progressively higher expenditures for styling/features and TQM/Six Sigma programs are
subject to diminishing marginal returns. In other words, the incremental gains from increasing
spending on styling/features from $5,000 per model to $10,000 per model will exceed the benefits from
increasing spending from $10,000 to $15,000 per model. Likewise, boosting TQM/Six Sigma spending
from $0.50 per pair to $1.00 per pair of capacity will have greater incremental benefit than boosting
spending from $1.00 to $1.50 per pair.