First, the definition: The pull principle is a concept for controlling the material flow in a production system. Those who organize their own production according to the pull principle only produce when there is a concrete demand. The decisive advantages are the avoidance of overproduction and extensive inventories as well as reduced throughput times and increased productivity. Find out about all the other advantages of the pull principle in the free guide from item Industrietechnik.

In lean production, high stock levels are one of the 7 types of waste (muda). Waste here means "pointless activity" - meaning that no contribution is made to value creation. The primary goal of lean production is to avoid waste. This is linked to an increase in added value and the careful use of materials. The example of the pull principle makes this particularly clear, especially when compared with the traditional push principle.

Comparison of the push and pull principle
The push principle relies on forecast-based production plans based on sales figures. The push principle ties up financial and physical resources due to excessive stock levels. Due to permanent storage, retrieval and interim storage, the material flow is interrupted, which leads to long throughput times. Each process must be controlled and planned separately. The batch size is then calculated for each production step without taking the entire value chain into account. There is no upper limit for the stock, especially as parts that are not currently required are put into storage. This leads to overproduction due to excessive stock levels, long lead times and unavailable parts (despite high inventory levels).

In contrast, production according to the pull principle is not based on demand estimates. Instead, production is geared towards current demand, thus increasing flexibility. Overproduction and excessive warehousing can thus be avoided. The advantages of the pull principle also include shorter throughput times and improved delivery performance. In the continuous improvement process (CIP), three pull methods follow one after the other: Kanban, the FIFO principle and finally one-piece flow (OPF). As there is no intermediate storage with OPF, throughput times and stock levels are the lowest here.