ABSTRACT
What does quality have to do with lean production? In a word: everything. Every product that has a physical flaw or fails to meet requirements or customer needs represents multiple wastes and nonvalue-added costs. For starters, a flawed product discovered by the producer must be reworked or discarded. To discover the flaws, the producer has to incur costs for inspection. A flawed product that gets into the hands of customers causes the customer aggravation and the producer additional costs for returns, repairs, warranties, and declining business.
