After all, that’s the place where the rubber meets the road. You can attend every packaging machinery exhibition the world has to offer and be absolutely dazzled by the sophisticated equipment on display. But when you see it operating commercially in a plant setting, it becomes more than a technology option that a manufacturer may or may not choose to invest in. It becomes the technology option that a specific manufacturer is betting on. Just knowing how much rides on its successful deployment makes it somehow matter so much more.
The other thing I like about a plant visit is the people I meet. Take, for example, Christian Koschorreck, the fellow I’m interviewing in the photo shown here. He’s an engineering manager at the Gutersloh, Germany, facility of Campina GmbH, a dairy company based in the Dutch town of Zaltbommel.
Campina graciously invited me to tour not only its Gütersloh plant but also its plant in Heilbronn, Germany. You can read about the Heilbronn plant in a story that begins on page 104. The Campina Gütersloh story will run next month.
But getting back to Mr. Koschorreck—or Herr Koschorreck, I should say. Among the things I was reminded of during our conversation is how successful a company can be when its marketing and packaging people work cohesively toward a mutually beneficial outcome. Koschorreck explained to me that, until a few years ago, the sale of single-serve dessert pudding cups in multipacks was relatively uncommon in Germany. But the marketing folks at Campina Heilbronn, after noticing how popular multipacks were becoming in other markets, decided to test a multipack concept of its own to gauge the response from German consumers.
“We produced enough for the market test by multipacking off-line,” recalls Koschorreck. “But it was soon apparent that consumers really liked the multipacks, so we needed an in-line solution. What we didn’t want to do is fill individual cups, store them, remove them from storage, and then run them through an off-line machine before releasing them into distribution. That consumes too much valuable time. It also involves infeed conveyors that, if they can’t be avoided, are a waste of floor space.”
As luck would have it, Anuga Food Tec opened in Cologne just about the time Koschorreck and his colleagues realized they were in need of an in-line multipacking system. At the Cologne show, they were able to kick the tires of a brand new multipacking system developed by Oystar A+F called the Set Line. “It didn’t take long for us to realize that this was just what we were looking for,” says Koschorreck.
The new machine takes cups right out of the filling and lidding operation and packs them in paperboard sleeves of four cups each. The sleeves are then traypacked by the same machine. And, because the marketing folks requested it, assorted flavors can be packed in the same tray. “Three multipacks of chocolate and three multipacks of vanilla, for example,” says Koschorreck.
The installation of the Set Line system was driven by a sales and marketing need. By embracing this need and responding adroitly, Campina’s packaging engineers positioned their firm to capture significant new market share.
All in all it’s a refreshing story of a consumer packaged goods company that understands how to generate positive outcomes by meshing the marketplace insights of its marketing department with the operational excellence of its packaging engineers. Think about it the next time you find yourself in one of those marketing vs. manufacturing turf wars we all hear about so often.
