News
Cessna Service Centers Introduce Satellite Inventory Initiative

Nov. 19, 2007, Wichita, Kan. – Cessna Aircraft Company, a Textron Inc. (NYSE: TXT) company, today announced a new satellite inventory initiative for Cessna-owned Citation Service Centers.

The new initiative features a centrally managed inventory system which makes the inventory equally available and accessible by all centers regardless of their location. A revised inventory and warehouse management software at Citation Parts Distribution was designed to improve communication between the service centers. This new system allows each center easy access to inventory availability at any Cessna-owned facility. Previously, each center managed its own inventory.

A two-year study of repeat orders was conducted to establish inventory requirements for common parts. Supplies are stocked based on this study with a target for immediate parts availability 80-85 percent of the time. For the remainder, next day delivery from the central parts inventory is most likely available.

 “Much work has been done to streamline our parts inventory and distribution,” said Jack Stiffler, vice president, Citation Parts Distribution.  “The centralized inventory management strategy, revised processes and alignment of the inventory has increased the aggregate capacity of inventory at our service centers and improved their efficiency. The end result is improved customer service, which is always our ultimate goal.”

The new program has also established common processes and warehouse layouts for all the centers to improve efficiency. Conformity is expected at all Cessna-owned Citation Service Centers by the beginning of 2008.