GA 129 | How to Apply Lean to Agriculture with Jeff Duarte

26 Nov 2025 · 33 min
Episode

26 Nov 2025 · 33 min

0:00

Jeff Duarte runs a California nursery growing grapevines and orchard trees with up to 900 seasonal workers. After a crash-course in Lean from an automotive supplier, the nursery measured crew productivity with photographs and defect tracking, achieving a 20% productivity bump initially and 30% year-over-year labor efficiency gains while cutting headcount 30% since 2015.

Questions this episode answers

About 900 people.

About 60 crews spread over a couple-hundred acres.

About 30–40% new people each year.

About 27 years.

About two years ago (from the time of the interview).

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