With the advent of the Fourth Industrial Revolution, production and manufacturing processes and systems have become more complex. Obtaining the best performance from them requires efficient and effective optimisation techniques that do not depend on the availability of process or system models. Such models are usually either not obtainable or mathematically intractable due to the high degrees of nonlinearities and uncertainties in the processes and systems to be represented. The Bees Algorithm is a powerful swarm-based intelligent optimisation metaheuristic inspired by the foraging behaviour of honeybees. The algorithm is conceptually elegant and extremely easy to apply. It has attracted users from virtually all fields of engineering and natural, physical, medical and social sciences. This article reviews the original Bees Algorithm and some of its recent enhancements and gives examples of its applications to optimisation problems in production and manufacturing. The aim is to demonstrate the simplicity, effectiveness and versatility of the algorithm and encourage its further adoption by engineers and researchers across the world to realise smart and sustainable manufacturing and production in the age of Industry 4.0 and beyond.