3M’s Aberdeen plant aims to be a ‘digital factory of the future’

By Andrew Weeks

Sam Allen is touched with pride whenever he hears 3M mentioned in conversations around his hometown of Aberdeen, South Dakota.

“I’m very proud to hear what people have to say,” he said. “Wherever you go around the neighborhoods, you can meet people who work here; there’s a connective layer to almost everything that we do.”

Allen, quality assurance manager at the Aberdeen plant, said it’s no wistful gesture that a global company operates a plant out of the town of some 30,000 people. It’s a perfect fit for the company and community, and residents seem to be proud of that connection.

“It’s like, ‘Wow, you work at 3M?’” Allen said of the way some people react. “I think it is really interesting to hear people talk about it (the way they do), for them to have an interest in it and knowing that a world-class company is in such a small community.”

The global company, located in St. Paul, started operations in 1902 and for its first 100 years was known as the Minnesota Mining and Manufacturing Co. Today it is simply known as 3M. The Aberdeen plant opened in 1975 with a focus on producing respiratory masks and various kinds of tape – two of the products that continue to keep the plant busy. But even within those lines are a multitude of different types of tapes and respirators.

Company wide, 3M produces some 60,000 products for a global market.

According to information from the company, “3M Aberdeen is a flagship plant for 3M’s Personal Safety, Industrial Adhesives & Tapes and Automotive Divisions, by consistently producing high quality Respiratory Protection and Tape products. 3M Aberdeen is one of the few sites that supports all four 3M business groups.” It also “is the largest N95 respirator producing plant in the US for 3M.”

The mission, specific to Aberdeen, is to be a “global manufacturing leader in the safe and quality production of respirators, filtration, and adhesive tapes that people trust daily for protection and to improve their lives.”

One doesn’t get to be a world-class company without innovating – and that’s what the company and its Aberdeen plant, some 200,000 square-feet in all, continues to do as it meets the challenges imposed by a tight supply chain and an economic landscape that seems unsure and unfooted as a global pandemic, hopefully, continues to recede.

To make that happen, it relies on skilled team members and technology.

“It’s kind of in your nature to want to improve,” Allen said, noting it definitely is in 3M’s nature to want to expand its capabilities and technologies. Likewise, the plant continues to seek high talent to meet the needs of an ever-demanding digital world.

A good engineer at 3M Aberdeen is one who wants to innovate and grow with the company, someone who thinks outside the box and wants to be an expert in their field.

“We hire for multiple engineering positions and I think that’s the beauty of 3M – there’s multiple options for people to enter into a quality engineering department,” said Matthew Heiberger, value stream manager for tape production at the plant.

The company has vision engineers – those who work with different technologies – and value-stream engineers, who work on long-term processes and improvements, among a number of other engineering disciplines.

“There’s multiple opportunities within 3M Aberdeen and with 3M Global,” he said.

In a previous conversation with Daniel Uhlir, human resources leader with the plant, it was noted that the Aberdeen facility is focused on being a “digital factory of the future.” It needs good people to make that happen.

But what exactly is a digital factory of the future?

“That’s a really loaded question,” said Erik Poe, value stream manager for all respiratory production at 3M Aberdeen. “From a high level, we’re making advancements with robotics. … We also have significant vision systems in the plant, so as products are being made, the camera looks at the product and determines whether or not it’s good or bad, it looks for a number of specific attributes. … And then we have different visualization techniques where we’re utilizing data from those cameras. It displays information for operators so they can make on-the-fly decisions as opposed to making a defective product … We know if something’s going wrong right away and we can make adjustments as necessary.”

Something similar happens with vibration technology, Heiberger said, which traditionally alerts if a large machine is about to fail. He said the company is piloting another way to use it to detect if small components of a machine are going bad so adjustments can be made ahead of time and not impact production.

“I’d say the biggest advancement from my perspective is that you have, historically, all these independent systems that operate independently from one another,” Poe said. “The next step in the factory’s future is really melding all those together and developing a system as a whole that’s smart enough to realize when something’s going wrong and then make the adequate adjustments as you go forward.”

Heiberger added: “I think there’s a broader term around technology. You can focus on robotics and the data portion of it, but there’s also other pillars that I would classify under technology … and then relating those material properties with our processes. … We have a lot of equipment that’s designed and developed internally.”

Besides technologies on the data, he continued, “there’s also a ton of work being done in teams at the local level and at the corporate level, working on new products, with materials, and how to process those throughout the lines.”

In 2020-21 the Aberdeen plant kept busy predominantly with the manufacturing of its respirators, which it makes for health care professionals and commercial industries as well as individuals. Poe said there are a number of different types of masks with different designs and for different uses.

It is likely you have a 3M mask somewhere in your coronavirus protection kit.

Masks have been used against SARS, birdflu and H1N1 outbreaks, the Mt. St. Helen’s eruption, Hurricane Katrina cleanup, forest fires and most recently the COVID19 pandemic.

The plant also makes a variety of tape products. The layman might know about Scotch tape, but there also is a variety of tapes for the automotive landscape, design and construction, and high-strength, double-sided acrylic foam tapes that, once in place, builds strength over time. Some tapes are made to order for the automotive, aerospace and industrial industries, among others.

As much as technology plays a role at 3M, it all comes back to the people — those who are willing to innovate and grow with the company.

“With the advancement in technology, I would say that we are cutting edge,” Poe said, noting “we foster people’s passion.”

“If somebody comes in with a specific passion for something in a very specific field, then we want to say, how do you make that better? How do you apply it to our lines?

“Sometimes they can make a career out of it because they are now the leading expert in that specific niche field. It’s something that we really try to foster here.”

Uhlir added: “Bsides the products, what’s going on here all the time is that there’s always the leverage of technological innovation. We’re constantly looking at how we can drive digital operations in our facility. And then we’re looking at how we continue to automate our processes to make sure we’re on the cutting edge of technology at all points in time.”

Allen is awaiting his next encounter with someone in the community, eager to hear what they might say about 3M. Personally, he is thankful for the progressive company that has provided him a place to innovate and grow his own skills.

“We do have pillars that we live by – 3M’s code of ethics, and innovation is one of those,” Allen said. “Every employee is asked to think scientifically, to not pass on any defects, that sort of thing. It’s kind of in your nature to want to improve, and so whenever there are ideas brought forth, I think that is living the 3M code.” www.rcsconst.com

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