Questions plant managers ask

Yes. The live demo runs the real board on sample data, no signup needed. Click around as much as you like: changes stay until you reload or press Reset demo, and nothing is saved. Settings, Metrics, the Actions list and the AI coach aren't in the demo. On a phone, the demo page shows a short walkthrough instead.

Your first login opens a sample board, and setting up your own cell takes about 10 minutes: name it, set the shift times and takt. Plan on a day or two to set up a whole department with targets and imported history. No IT department required.

No install and no server. ShopBoard runs in a web browser. Wall view puts a department board on a floor TV from any computer with a browser, and refreshes every minute. If your network only allows approved sites, IT adds two web addresses.

Yes, as CSV files. In Settings you can import cells and targets, daily SQDC, hour-by-hour, issues, your team and a parts list. Match our column headers and load the file. Plan limits on cells and users still apply. Scrap history doesn't import.

There is no live ERP connector yet. Every plan includes CSV import for cells, SQDC history, hour-by-hour, issues, parts and your team: export from your ERP or spreadsheet, match our column headers, and load it. On Enterprise, we map your exports to ShopBoard imports with you.

Not yet. There's no API, machine connection or MES link. Hour-by-hour actuals are typed in at a desk or on the cell's TV, the S, Q and D numbers are typed into the cell board, anyone signed in logs scrap by hand, and history comes in by CSV import.

Anyone signed in clicks an hour that has started and types the actual, on a desk or on the cell's TV in Wall view. On Free, keep the cell's screen signed in to your account. Starter gives up to 5 people their own login; Professional gives everyone one.

A TV and any computer with a web browser plugged into it. Sign in, open a cell or department board and click Wall. A department board in Wall view refreshes every minute, and the mouse pointer hides after 5 seconds without movement, so it can run all shift. Bookmark the Wall page and the TV opens straight into it. On a cell's TV, operators can still enter the hour's actual and log scrap.

Tablets, yes. ShopBoard runs in the tablet's web browser, and Wall view makes the buttons big enough for a finger. Phones, not yet. There's no app, and on a screen narrower than a small tablet the side menu disappears with nothing in its place, so most pages are out of reach. Plan on a desk computer, a tablet or the cell's TV.

No. It needs a network connection, at the desk and at the TV. There's no offline mode, so a number typed while the connection is down doesn't save. Type it again once the screen is back online. A department board in Wall view catches up on its next one-minute refresh.

S counts safety incidents for the day: zero is green, anything else is red. Q is first-pass yield and D is schedule attainment, both entered as a percent against the cell's targets. C is the day's scrap dollars, filled in from the scrap log. You set the Quality and Delivery targets for each cell. The four measures themselves are fixed, and there's no OEE or custom metric yet.

On the Issues page, Check Duplicates lists the issues on the same cell and category that are still open and haven't gone to a 3C yet. A supervisor or manager can click Link to add the new report to the old issue's repeat count instead of opening a new one, and the count shows as ×2, ×3 on the cell board. ShopBoard doesn't escalate on its own. A supervisor or manager decides when an issue becomes a 3C and when a 3C becomes an A3, and the A3 opens with the 3C's cause on its fishbone and its countermeasure in its countermeasures table.

There are three roles. Operators enter SQDC numbers and hour-by-hour actuals, log issues and scrap, and update the actions assigned to them. Supervisors can also turn issues into 3Cs and A3s, link repeats, set the default hour-by-hour plan, fix scrap entries and see every action. Managers also get Settings and billing. To add someone, a manager enters their email in Settings > Team. They get a Join button when they create their account with that address at app.shopboard.live. Signing up on shopboard.live instead starts a separate company, so send them the app link. ShopBoard doesn't send the invite email, so tell them yourself.

Yes. A manager sets up shift patterns once in Settings and gives each cell its shifts. The cell board then gets a tab per shift, each with its own hour-by-hour plan and actuals, and scrap is logged with a shift number (1, 2 or 3). The SQDC letters are one set per cell per day, not per shift. A night shift gets its grid too, with the hours after midnight kept under the day it started.

Not from one account yet. A ShopBoard account is one plant: departments and cells under one facility board. There's no roll-up across plants, and each login belongs to one account, so a second plant is a second account. On Enterprise, we set up each plant with you.

On Supabase servers in the US, on a paid plan with daily backups. Only people you add to your account can see your boards. We don't sell your data or use it for ads. Email us any time for a copy, or to have it deleted.

Not to a spreadsheet yet. You can print the monthly report or any A3 to PDF, and export an A3 to PowerPoint with editable tables for a review meeting. For a full copy of your data, email us.

No. ShopBoard trains no models. The AI Lean Coach (Professional and up) sends nothing until someone clicks it. Then that 3C or A3, the cell and department, a summary of recent results, and how a few past issues of the same kind were fixed go to Anthropic, whose API terms bar training on it.

Yes. On Professional and up, a manager can switch the coach off for the whole account in Settings, or turn it off for operators so only supervisors and managers can use it. The coach buttons stay on screen either way, and pressing one shows a message that coaching is off. Each person gets 20 coach requests a day unless the manager sets a different number, from 1 to 100. ShopBoard keeps a count of requests, not the conversations.

No. Each plan is one flat price with limits. Free: 1 department, 2 cells, 1 user. Starter: 3 departments, 10 cells and 5 users. Professional: unlimited departments, cells and users.

Yes, and yearly billing takes 20% off. Starter is $159 a month, billed $1,908 a year. Professional is $399 a month, billed $4,788 a year. Switch between monthly and yearly on the billing page.

Free doesn't expire. Starter is $199 a month for 3 departments, 10 cells and 5 users. Professional is $499 a month for unlimited departments, cells and users, plus the AI Lean Coach. Upgrade from the billing page. Your boards and history carry over.

Everything in Professional, plus guided setup and training for your team, your ERP or spreadsheet exports mapped to ShopBoard imports, each plant set up with you, and priority support from the founder. It starts at $999 a month. Email us to set it up.

Yes. An admin cancels from the billing page. If ShopBoard isn't working for you, email us within 30 days of your first payment and we refund that payment in full. No partial refunds after that.

Email hello@shopboard.live and the founder answers, usually within one business day. Professional gets a same-day reply. The founder's own 150-person machining and assembly plant runs ShopBoard every morning.