Toyota Material Handling recently held its fifth annual Toyota Lean Management (TLM) Lean Champion Conference from August 19-21 in Fort Worth, Texas. The main purpose of the TLM Conference is to gather dealer lean champions to share best practices and explore real-world examples. This year’s conference, which was hosted by Shoppa’s Material Handling, focused largely on building a strong leadership foundation within a dealership to support their lean management system and introduced the first installment of a dealer playbook series focused on TLM application in material handling dealerships.
Attendees shared their internal continuous improvement activities, challenges they’ve faced, and how they’ve overcome them. Several Lean champions also presented their current best practices of using TLM to help solve customer problems (which included material handling sales benefits to dealers). Keith Ingels of TMHNA shared a keynote presentation on the integration of Toyota Lean Management, Raymond Lean Management, and ASEC.
A highlight of the annual TLM Conference is the presentation of the Lean Champion of the Year award, which is presented to a lean leader who embodies TLM values and behaviors and drives significant continuous improvement within their dealership. We would like to formally congratulate Jason Froman of Williams Toyota Lift, the 2025 Lean Champion of the Year award winner.
Congratulations, Jason, and thank you to everyone for their excellent contributions to this year’s event.
