Elkay Plumbing Products Division - 1262 Words

Summary: Background: Elkay was the American largest manufacturer of stainless steel residential sinks which extended its scope into various kinds of products with only a few competitors. Its Plumbing Products Division produced different level and priced sinks in three plants separately based on different process requirements and characters of products and further invented itself to become the industry’s innovator. Elkay’s main market included North America and selected international markets. In 2007, Elkay’s main outlet market begun to collapse; prices of raw materials increased sharply; Chinese competitors began to encroach on its low-end and threaten its relationships with key customers together with its pricing pressure from retailers†¦show more content†¦In addition, it wrongly allocated its indirect costs at volume bases. The use of process technology mentioned in the case led to an increase in factory overheads Since direct labor hours was not a cost driver of them, allocating its large proportion of fixed factory overheads and other indirect batch-level costs on the basis of DLHs in this cost system did not accurately measure how resources were being used. As a result, these inaccurate allocations would have significant costs to Elkay. Moreover, it disregarded its cost structure in which most costs were â€Å"fixed† that would not vary in the short run and should be allocated based on its practical capacity. By using the â€Å"actual sales volume† as the allocation base for allocating its large corporate overheads, this standard costing system in fact over-pricing its products for its actual productivity was lower than the practical capacity under the intense competition. As a consequence of all problem within the standard costing system, PPD urgently needed an accurate costing system. Indeed, PPD had ever tried to solve these problems by developing a simple Excel-based ABC model. Whereas, due to the difficulties of implementing and maintaining it; the incompatibility with other control systems; managers’ lack of awareness of the benefit of ABC system and employees’ worried about headcount. The