|
Product recall is calling back a product which is not in
conformity with the standards committed to the customers from the
market. While some recalls if not executed immediately could endanger
the safety and well-being of the consumers, certain recalls
become necessary due to social, cultural and environmental issues. All
recalls need not end up with the product being destroyed permanently.
In most of the cases, barring food products and pharmaceuticals,
the products recalled are reworked upon and re-offered to customers.
While sometimes only a small part of the output is recalled, in
other instances the entire batch and in extreme cases the entire output of
a product line may have to be recalled.
A manufacturer wishing away product recalls is perhaps being
over optimistic. Goods or services (broadly categorized as
products) that are produced, whether by human beings or by machines
have some heterogeneity, however small the percentage (or PPM) of
non-conformance may be, due to inherent process
limitations. While the manufacturers aim to minimize the defects in
the products marketed by them, beyond a point (say 100 PPM) it
becomes exceedingly difficult and cost-ineffective to reduce the defects
and therefore zero defects is more often a notion than being an
absolute reality.
This article lists few major product recalls in the last
two decades and the factors that led to such abnormal situations. It
also attempts to analyze the impact of product recalls on the working
of the organizations and finally offers few suggestions as to how
product recalls are to be handled by all the stakeholders concerned
with minimum permanent damage to the society at large. |
