How to choose the best end-of-line equipment to stand out on shelf Your investment guide to selecting a machine to improve your entire production line www.somic-packaging.com
How DoesDifferentYourProduct Look On-Shelf?
Today’s retail environment is incredibly crowded and competitive. You’re under pressure to stand out on shelf but a lot of factors go into turning a new concept into an on shelf sensation. You’re getting ready to make a big decision that involves spending a lot of money. We want to ensure that you have all the right information to make the best decision based on your needs. We created this guide to help you identify the most important criteria for selecting the right end-of-line equipment for your production line. We have also provided you with more information about your available options in the marketplace and the options that exist. get
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Critical operation costs, such as materials used and personnel to operate the equipment should be considered alongside your equipment choices. Additionally, lower quality equipment will create unnecessary maintenance costs and detrimental unplanned downtime for your production.
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With end of line equipment, there can appear to be a significant difference in lower vs higher end cost levels for your machine. However, upon closer examination, much more goes into calculating your costs than just the equipment itself.
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What Matters Most When Evaluating Equipment Options
It’s hard to compare your equipment options without seeing the full picture of how this equipment will impact your production line, in either a positive or negative way. All equipment has costs, but some equipment is more expensive than others. How do you know which criteria is the most important so you can compare all of your viable options?
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Typically your production line will start with your essential equipment, usually centering around a few key pieces of equipment: However, many equipment manufacturers fail to mention all the other cost centers of your production line that your equipment choice affects.
Understanding Your Available Options
As you’ll discover, lower cost systems do come with unexpected costs. When you start to evaluate what it takes to operate your production line on a daily basis, other critical aspects of production start to come to light.
When shopping for new equipment, be it to replace equipment on an existing line or to start up a new production line, it’s easy to consider all equipment the same because it appears as though it performs the same function. But the truth is that not all equipment is created equal.
When evaluating what equipment will best suit your production line, it helps to understand all the tasks involved in producing the products on this line. Some equipment will carry a better lifetime value than other options because it serves multiple tasks on your production line.
Below is an average cost vs investment comparison chart to see the full picture and arm you with more discussion points to have with your potential equipment vendors.
www.somic-packaging.com How do calculateyouthe cost of your equipment? You need to add up all the activities for the end of your production line to ensure you select the best option to stand out on shelf. There’s a price to low quality equipment. SOMIC equipment brings you the highest industry quality and comes with the industry’s best customer service. And it actually costs you 25% less than comparable equipment over a three year period.
Floor space savings up to 65% with SOMIC: With a SOMIC system, you will save up to 65% of the floor space that would otherwise be occupied by 3 separate machines. SOMIC integrates 3 functioning machines into a single machine.
Future line changeover flexibility:
Raise Your ROI, Lower Your TCO Wouldn’t it be nice if your equipment brought you a high degree of flexibility and integration that allowed you to to differentiate on shelf? With SOMIC equipment, you can implement top-of-the-line, end-of-line equipment with a positive return on your investment and lower total cost of ownership. How can you get started? Read on to discover the key questions you should be asking your potential vendors to determine the best investment you can make.
On shelf packaging differentiation: Not all equipment allows you to package your products in convenient, cost-effective, differentiated formats. SOMIC’s set of format options are all designed to make differentiation a non-issue. We simplify functional, beautiful packaging formats for your products.
AFTERBEFORE
Additionally, consider these factors that also affect your cost:
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At some point in the future, you may adjust your production line. Ideally, you don’t have to purchase all new equipment to reconfigure your line. With SOMIC machines, there’s a lot of functionality in each machine to allow for future configuring without swapping the equipment out for your entire line.
Carton Material: What material are your boxes made of: Corrugated board or paper board?
Arrangement in Carton: What is the arrangement of your products in the case? Carton Style: What style and purpose do you have in mind for your distribution packaging? Brown-box shipper, Retail-Ready, or both?
When evaluating all the various types of equipment that are available, the sooner you’re able to narrow your options down, the easier and faster your process becomes.
Product Type: What type of products do you run and what is the primary packaging?
Number of Formats: How many variations of finished packages do you want to run?
2. How much floor space does your equipment occupy? But then dive in to press your possible partners for details with “how” questions:
Questions to ask your potential vendors
1. What product format options do you offer?
4. How flexible is your equipment if we need to change formats on this line in the future?
In order to narrow down your options, we have created a list of questions you can answer for your potential vendors to sharpen the accuracy of your initial proposal and speed the process up for you.
Questions to ask yourself
Your Starting PointA question series to guide the best decision
“What” & “yes or no” questions are a great way to quickly separate the partners that clearly won’t work. For example:
3. How do you ensure your equipment will not breakdown on us at a critical production moment? How do you ensure you’re able to swiftly respond with support if it were to?
Speed: How many packages do you run on your existing lines? Do you intend to increase this?
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www.somic-packaging.com Frequently Asked Questions We Can Answer For You 321
What does the installation process look like, time-wise?
The installation process (outlined below) is typically completed in just 3-10 days depending on the complexity of your system.
Since the SOMIC machine is a single frame module, it is a plug and play installation. There are several components such as infeed conveyors and magazines that require some assembly to the machine frame which can be completed on day one. The machine is then powered up and commissioning is conducted on each of the Next,formats.your production line is brought back to life and the SOMIC machine then starts the production/commissioning process ramping up to 100% line speed. Our technical experts also provide operator and maintenance training during production. SOMIC machines are intuitive and simple to operate. While operating a new machine at your facility can feel intimidating, our service team is on site to walk your team through the start up of your new machine, simplifying the process. The touch screen HMI is as familiar to use as any mobile phone. It’s thoughtfully laid out and easy to follow. Operators are usually comfortable with the operational process after just 1-2 days of production. If necessary, SOMIC also offers classroom training with more in-depth theory of operation and maintenance instruction.
If your SOMIC equipment should stop unexpectedly, the first place to go is the operator screen on the HMI. The display will immediately identify the problem area with instruction on how to correct the problem and restart the machine. If the operator or maintenance team is still unable to correct the problem, SOMIC is only a phone call away. Our dedicated service technicians can usually walk you through the problem over the telephone. If required, we can also connect to the SOMIC machine via the secure VPN after you open the connection. Here the SOMIC technician can usually spot the problem, identify the correction, and get you back up and running in minutes. If a service visit is required, our technicians can travel to most locations within 8 – 12 hours.
I am nervous about using a new system in our facility. How easy is it to get the team up and running on it? What happens if the machine breaks down - what sort of support do you offer?
Over the past 45 plus years, SOMIC has installed approximately 1,188 machines in 42 countries around the world. Of these 1,188 machines there are over 140 machines currently running in North America.
Do you have a customer facility we could visit to see this equipment in action and speak with the customer about their experience with SOMIC?
How many SOMIC machines are installed world-wide?
To read the full story behind this testimonial, continue reading on the following pages.
We were on a short timeline to research, order and install new equipment, and it was clear that our decision to switch to SOMIC had better work. The risk was going with a new case packer company that we had no experience with, and no one here had ever heard of them. But we did our due diligence, saw the machines running in a production environment, and talked to people who used the equipment before making the decision. Would we do the same if we did it all over again? Absolutely.
Steve Tramp, general manager of the Rochester facility, The Kroger Co. “ “
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How long is the lifespan of a SOMIC machine?
Visiting a current SOMIC customer running one or more SOMIC case packers is a great way to get a firsthand look at our case packers running in a real production environment. Additionally, speaking with operators and plant maintenance professionals is an ideal education opportunity. One on one discussions enable you, as a perspective SOMIC owner, the ability to ask specific questions about the day-to-day life working with a SOMIC case packer.
You can expect decades of productive work from the SOMIC case packers. Not only are the SOMIC machines easy to maintain, but the ability to adapt to new package formats ensures their long useful life.
Today, a variation of SOMIC’s custom 424 W3 wraparound case packer machines have replaced Kroger’s previous equipment line. The retail ready units support the packaging lines for chunk and shredded cheese, running three shifts per day on a seven-day a week schedule.
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Kroger Foods celebrates 3 Years of Machine Excellence
Three years ago, the nation’s largest grocer took a calculated risk with a relatively new case packer company. But officials at The Kroger Co.’s manufacturing facility in Rochester, Minnesota, did their homework and were convinced that SOMIC Packaging’s technology provided them with a better packaging solution.
The installation and early results of the five machines installed in 2019 were so successful that Kroger has since added a sixth machine in Rochester. Six others were installed and run at Kroger’s sister plant in Crawfordsville, Indiana, an operation that packages chunk, shreds and cheese slice products. Steve Tramp, general manager of the Rochester facility, said conversations within the industry started the ball rolling with SOMIC. At that point, Kroger was in need of automated retail ready packaging machinery for their packaged cheese products. “We had no knowledge of the SOMIC case packers until we contacted Peter Fox and he visited us,” Tramp said. “We toured our packaging operation and he saw the lack of space that we were dealing with. Peter thought it was a tight space but with some slight adjustments, he said they would be able to fit all of the case packers.”
The next step for Tramp was seeing the machine in production. Fox spoke with some customers to see who would grant access and share knowledge and opinions of their 424 machines. Once Growers Express approved the request to visit their frozen vegetable processing facility in Yuma, Arizona, Tramp assembled a large group. This included engineering teams led by Rick Eppen and Tim Nichols who are based at their Rochester and Crawfordsville operations, in addition to engineers from Kroger’s general office.
“What impressed us most,” continued Tramp, “were the rave reviews we got from the operators and maintenance team. They told us how the machine was installed in about two days and how they were running at speed by the end of the week. That was the final thing that sold us on the machine.” When the machines arrived, Tramp’s team and SOMIC technicians were ready to tackle the installation phase. “What was most challenging about this process is that we had to pull out the old machines and install the SOMIC units, and have them up and running in one week,” Tramp recalled. “Peter promised they could meet this timeline and they did. It was a remarkable effort that was very well executed.”
Tramp said the SOMIC 424 W3 machines in Rochester and Crawfordsville have delivered the speed and efficiency he expected, and more. “We love the small footprint, which made all of this possible. Maintenance is very minimal and simple. You have to lubricate a few things and clear corrugated dust from the vacuum filter cannisters. But overall, the machines are easy to navigate on the HMI and we can adjust the parameters in 1mm increments. The program set up is unique but once you understand it, it is very simple to run.”
Founded in 1883 The Kroger Co. is the nation’s largest grocer. It serves more than nine million customers daily with nearly 2,800 retail food stores in 35 states. Supermarkets such as Ralph’s, Dillons, Pick ‘n Save and Mariano’s, the multi-department store Fred Meyer, and price-impact warehouse stores Food 4 Less and Foods Co., are all Kroger brands. It also ranks as one of the world’s largest retailers with annual sales of $132.5 billion.
An Overview of The Kroger Co. 140 Years of Providing to Communities
“Up to this point we liked what we heard and saw. But this was such a huge project, we needed to see it running in production,” he said. “The machine in Yuma ran frozen vegetables in a stand-up pouch and it was impressive. The machine motion was incredibly smooth and effortless, and it had a small footprint. The case packer conditioned the pouches, stood them upright and packed 30 cases per minute.”
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SOMIC Verpackungsmaschinen GmbH & Co. KG Am Kroit 7-11 · 83123 Amerang · Germany Phone: +49 8075 916-0 E-mail: www.somic-packaging.cominfo@somic.de SOMIC America Inc. 500 Lone Oak Road · Suite #200 · Eagan · MN 55121 · USA Phone: +1 651 419 6050 E-mail: www.somic-packaging.cominfo@somic.us
