Also called JIT, pull production
What is just-in-time?
Making or buying only what is needed, in the quantity needed, at the time it is needed.
What else it is called
- Other names
- JIT, pull production
- In French
- juste-à-temps
Related entries
Understanding just-in-time
Producing and purchasing against actual demand rather than a forecast, so that material arrives shortly before it is used and finished goods ship shortly after they are made. Done properly it releases a large amount of cash and shortens lead times considerably.
It also removes the cushion. A plant running on buffer stock can absorb a late supplier, a bad batch or a broken machine without the customer noticing. Take the stock out and every one of those becomes a missed shipment, which is why the method only works alongside short changeovers, dependable quality and suppliers who deliver when they said.
The supply disruptions of the early 2020s changed how this is discussed. The lesson most manufacturers took was not that the method is wrong but that single-sourcing a critical component from one distant supplier with no buffer is a risk decision somebody should have made deliberately.
In practice
The practical version for most Canadian plants: run lean internally where you control the variables, and hold deliberate buffer stock on anything imported, single-sourced or long-lead.
Frequently asked
Is just-in-time dead after the supply chain disruptions?
No, but unqualified just-in-time across every part is. What survived is the internal discipline. What changed is that buffer stock on critical, long-lead or single-sourced items is now treated as a deliberate risk decision rather than a failure of lean.