Frozen Foods Maker Upgrades to Laser Coding
PREVIOUS PROCESS:
A frozen foods manufacturer had requirements to upgrade obsolete marking equipment on their frozen food line. The product was loaded into a box and sent through a folding and sealing carton machine. After the product was sealed, the date and lot code were placed on the boxes near the top of the seal.
In addition to the equipment being close to obsolete, the manufacturer experienced several maintenance related issues. The Waxjet unit took 45 minutes to warm up in the cold room environment and because of the age of the equipment, downtime was frequent. The bar code was often hard-to-read and the print was often less than desirable.
ID TECHNOLOGY PROPOSAL OR SOLUTION:
By upgrading to a laser coder, ID Technology was able to improve the process in several ways. As before, the products are placed in an open box on a conveyor that travels into a folding and sealing machine. The laser coder is now installed at the point of carton erection and sealing. A "Best if Used By" date and a 20 character lot code are printed during this process. By installing the laser marking system into the automatic folding and glue-sealing machine, the customer was able to relocate the code to a different part of the carton, making the appearance of the code much more desirable.
COST SAVINGS/PRODUCTIVITY GAINS:
The customer will experience significant cost savings because there are no consumables. In addition, the laser marking system requires much less maintenance and downtime leading to great productivity gains.
The customer chose ID Technology's laser solution over the Markem unit because of the on-site laser demo and appearance of the laser mark. They preferred the vector fonts offered by ID Technology's laser v. being limited by the dot matrix fonts offered by the Markem unit.
Other contributing factors leading to the purchase of the ID Technology equipment related to the customer's previous experience with ID Technology's product support, sales support and company reputation.
