Views: 2713

Cold Storage Warehouse Automation: 6 Money-Saving Benefits Beyond Labor Costs

Automation is on the rise in industrial facilities, food processing plants and cold storage warehouses. At Stellar, we’ve seen more client requests for automation in the past year than ever before.

When people think of automation and cost savings, the obvious usually comes to mind first: labor costs. Projected minimum wage increases and the scarcity of people willing to work in a cold storage environment are driving more owners to invest in automation.

But automating your warehouse can yield more savings beyond just the payroll. Here are six more benefits that you may not have considered.

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Views: 2657

Project Commissioning: The Key to Meeting Your Food Plant’s Construction Goals

Constructing a new food plant is more complex than ever. Increased competition, changing consumer trends, automation technology and energy efficiency are all factors that owners must consider.

Among all these moving parts, it can be easy for a plant owner’s original vision or goals to be lost or not fully realized. That’s why commissioning is becoming a critical part of the design-build process. A commissioning partner works with the owner throughout the design-build process to ensure their goals are achieved.  

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Views: 2631

Tips for Managing Multiple SKUs to Meet Customer Demands

The food and beverage industry today is all about consumer demand and meeting preferences for tastes, specialty ingredients and preparations (such as non-GMO, Kosher and gluten-free), flexible packaging, and convenient serving sizes.

Take the coffee industry for example: One customer wants a special blend in a light roast with a medium grind. Another customer wants a different blend in a dark roast with a fine grind. You can do the math and see the exponential impact of the options. Every variation creates a unique SKU for the coffee producer.

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Views: 2624

Five Steps in Energy Modeling to Make Your Building More Efficient

This week, we welcome guest bloggers Thulasi Narayan and Andrew Lee from Paladino and Company. Paladino is an industry leading green building and sustainability consulting firm with a team of architects, engineers, building scientists, commissioning agents and business analysts who advise companies on energy efficiency. Stellar often partners with Paladino to estimate energy performance, help develop energy reduction strategies and track estimated performance against the project’s energy goal during the design process.

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Views: 2604

3 Ways to Leverage Predictive Analytics in Your Processing Facility

Food and beverage manufacturing has been one of the slower industries to adopt new technology. While machine learning and artificial intelligence may sound daunting, this technology offers a valuable return on investment.

Here are three major ways to benefit from big data tools in your processing plant.

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Views: 2603

Are HEPA Filters the Best Choice for Your Facility?

Billions of particles can lace unconditioned air with dust, dirt, bacteria and viruses. That’s why your food plant’s air filters are crucial to preventing contamination and ensuring food safety. But when it comes to filtration, more isn’t necessarily better, especially when it comes to high-efficiency particulate air (HEPA) filters. HEPA filters are a necessity for many plant environments, but the level of filtration can vary, potentially making certain options expensive overkill for others.

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New Automation and Controls System? Educate and Involve Operators Early

As more food and beverage processing moves from mechanical to automated, it’s important to hire the right people who can operate and troubleshoot from the plant floor. Once you have qualified technical staff in place, transferring knowledge about your automation and controls systems to them is crucial.

At Stellar, we often help food manufacturers configure new facilities, so we understand the process and what it takes to make it go smoothly. When it comes to training your plant personnel on the automation and controls, follow these tips for an efficient startup at your next facility.

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Standard Equipment Specifications: Benefits and Considerations

A maintenance access platform illustrates a sanitary design that leaves no chance for any possible bacterial harborage.

While designing a new food processing production line or adding to a line, there are a number of factors to consider when outlining equipment specifications, including product run rates, packaging format, temperature and many others. Plant managers often turn to different vendors to provide different components, but it is essential to have standardized equipment to improve efficiency, production, sanitation and aesthetics.

Inappropriate or incompatible equipment can mean loss of production time and loss of income. Whether you’re adding a single piece of equipment or designing a full production line from scratch, detailed, standard requirements should be communicated among the entire team participating in the design process.

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