For warp knitting machine builder Karl Mayer, maintaining good relations with its customers has always meant supplying customised machines, providing a full range of services and training machine operators. Now, the German company is to train operators in their own factories.

The Karl Mayer Academy’s training courses are not only being held at selected Karl Mayer subsidiaries, but they have also been held in the factories of the company’s customers since the end of last year. The company says this has allowed warp knitting companies to reduce their costs and enabled entire teams of workers to be trained at the same time, a service that has been particularly welcomed during the global economic crisis.

The Karl Mayer Academy went ‘on tour’ for the first time in 2009 when the first instructor travelled from Obertshausen to Falkenau in Saxony to train workers in the production of warp-knitted lace at Spiga GmbH. The on-site course was held from 3 September to 12 December 2009, and ran from Thursdays through to Saturdays and a follow-up course was held from 21 January to 13 March 2010.

“We have supplied Spiga’s staff with comprehensive technical information. They now know exactly what their machines are capable of and how the performance potential of this high-tech machinery can be fully utilised,” explained Stephan Jung, one of the Academy’s instructors. “What is more, it will give the participants greater knowledge and expertise, generate more new ideas and increase job satisfaction,” adds Jung.

The first Karl Mayer Academy international external course took place at Wollwines in Virginia, which is a subsidiary of Hanesbrands Inc. The two-week ‘A to Z of warp knitting’ course started on 18 January – at the letter ‘H’ as some of the participants had already attended training courses at Karl Mayer’s headquarters in Obertshausen. The knowledge they had acquired there greatly increased the level of expertise in the departments where they worked, which Karl Mayer says, perfectly illustrates the success of its training strategy.

Karl Mayer says, Robert Kuna, one of the Academy instructors, was able to pass on a great deal of information that would be useful to the participants in their daily work. “The mechanics, shift supervisors and machine operators have reached a new level of understanding,” said the instructor when talking about the success of his work.

“The group quickly grasped the background to many long-standing operations and were able to get to grips with the machine operations”. To increase the practical value of the training course, Hanesbrands made a machine from its own factory available specifically for instructing the trainees on how to handle the various machine features and to improve their practical understanding of the technology, a commitment to greater knowledge which Karl Mayer says will pay off in the day-to-day operations of the factory.