Production Report Template: Daily Output, Rejects, Yield

A daily production report is one line for each batch made that day: what was planned, how many good units came out, how many were rejected, how many labor hours it took, and any time the line stood still and why. Added up over a week, it shows which products run smoothly and which ones lose units and hours, which is where a small maker's margin goes without anyone noticing. In the example below, a snack maker's week shows its honey almond bars coming out at 98.5% of plan, while its chocolate cranberry bars made only 89% of plan, rejected nearly 4% and lost 70 minutes to a dull cutter and thick chocolate. Below is what goes on the report, reading it, the week's summary, and a free template.

The short version

• One line per batch: date, batch, product, planned, good, rejects, labor hours, downtime and reason.
• Of plan = good ÷ planned; reject rate = rejects ÷ (good + rejects).
• Good units an hour = good ÷ labor hours; it's the number that sets your labor cost.
• Write the reason for every stop, in plain words.
• Add up the week by product; the worst line is the one to fix first.
• Good plus rejects below plan means the batch came up short before anything was rejected.
• TaroStack records each batch's good and rejected units and costs it at what it used. More below.

What goes on the report

Sea Grape Snacks, a made-up granola bar and trail mix maker in St. Petersburg, Florida, I use in these examples, logs each batch:

Rejects are units made but not sellable: broken bars, underweight bags, bad seals. Downtime is time the line stood still, with its reason; "chocolate too thick" is more useful than "delay."

The week's summary

The chocolate bars are the line to fix. They made 1,068 good bars and 42 rejects against a plan of 1,200, so 90 bars weren't even made: the batches came up short before anything was thrown out, which points to the mix, the pan or the cutting, not the packing. And they run at 79 good bars an hour against 101 for the honey almond bars, so each bar carries about a quarter more labor. How to measure what a batch should yield is in batch yield formula.

Reading it

Of plan says whether you made what you meant to; a low number with few rejects means the batch was short from the start. The reject rate says how much of what you made you couldn't sell, which is ingredients and hours in the bin. Good units an hour is labor productivity: at $20 an hour, 100 bars an hour is 20 cents of labor a bar, 79 is 25 cents. Downtime with reasons shows what to fix: a dull blade is a maintenance schedule, thick chocolate a temperature check. How to plan the week's batches against those rates is in production schedule example.

Get the template

Download the production report template. Two sheets: the daily report, one row per batch with the date, batch, product, planned and good units, rejects, labor hours and downtime with its reason, working out the share of plan, reject rate and good units an hour; and a summary that totals each product for the week or month. It's an ordinary Excel file with no macros, and it works in Google Sheets, LibreOffice and Numbers. The batch's ingredients, lots and checks belong on its batch record; what goes on one is in what is a batch record.

Where this stops working

Ten products, two shifts, batches typed in at the end of the day from scraps of paper, and a summary that has to be rebuilt every month. A sheet can't say what the rejected bars cost in ingredients, or whether the chocolate bars' recipe really yields what it claims across a season of batches.

How TaroStack does it

TaroStack records each batch's good and rejected units and costs it at what it used.

Good and rejected units. Recording a batch takes its ingredients and packaging off stock from the lots used, at what you paid, and records the good and rejected quantities and the labor minutes, so the cost of each good unit includes the rejects.

Recipe truth. Your own batch history shows whether a recipe yields what it claims, so a product that keeps coming up short shows up, and each batch shows its actual cost against the recipe's standard.

And the checks. Batch record forms carry your own fields, such as chocolate temperature or bag weight, with limits and sign-off.

Recipes, batches, lots and batch record forms are on every plan, from $49 a month. The first 30 days are free, with no credit card. If you'd like a hand setting up, ask, and we'll do it with you.

Questions people also ask

What should a daily production report include?

For each batch: the date, batch number, product, units planned, good units, rejects, labor hours, and downtime with the reason. From those: the share of plan made, the reject rate, and good units an hour.

How do you calculate production yield?

Good units ÷ planned units gives the share of plan made; rejects ÷ (good + rejects) gives the reject rate. In the example, 1,068 good bars against a plan of 1,200 is 89%.

What is a good reject rate?

It depends on the product and process; the useful thing is the trend and the comparison between products. In the example, 1.5% for one bar and 3.8% for another says where to look.

How do I measure labor productivity in production?

Good units ÷ labor hours. In the example, 100.6 honey almond bars an hour against 79.1 chocolate bars an hour, so each chocolate bar carries about a quarter more labor.