As a manufacturer or distributor, handling increased demand is challenging. Determining the right time to automate your packaging line requires thorough research and analysis. Luckily, there are many common signals that tell you when it’s time for your company to automate its packaging process.
Here are 4 common signs that your company is ready to automate its packaging line.
You Can’t Keep Up with Demand
One of the top reasons companies inquire about industrial packaging equipment is when they fail to keep up with increasing demand. As a result, vendors are getting angry, employees are overworked, customers are losing their patience, and you risk losing business to competitors who can move faster. Sounds familiar?
The truth is, a packaging system can only move as fast as its slowest component, which is us – the human. Packaging automation drastically reduces human involvement in the process, thus increasing the speed of packaging process. Automating your packaging line means you can respond quicker to demand increases, thus vendors get their products on time, your employees can work more efficiently, and your consumers can get what they want.
Automating your packaging process can lead to improved production speeds, thus helping you to keep up with an increased level of output. If you are expecting a large amount of growth over the coming year, or planning to expand your product line, then you should consider adding automated packaging equipment.
The Packaging Team is Overwhelmed by Orders
Another indication of the need to automate is when you notice that your packaging team is overworked. Increased demand puts strain on your employees, which may lead to an increase in injuries, burnout, and stress due to the repetitive nature of their tasks and long working hours. Another important sign to notice is when you have a high number of employees requesting to resign. This can be a sign that the process is strenuous, thus harming the workers physically and mentally.
An overwhelmed workforce leads to slow production, which can cause delayed orders, agitated customers, and lost sales. The company ends up producing less than its capacity – in other words, you are limiting your sales potential. If the slowdown lasts for only a short period, you may be able to resolve it by hiring more staff. However, if adding more employees does not resolve the problem, then you may want to consider automated packing.
When your unfulfilled orders continue to increase even when you have expanded your packaging team, the best solution is to invest in industrial packaging machines, such as bulk bag filling machine and open mouth bag filler. By introducing automated solutions, you can reduce the number of injuries and make your warehouses safer for workers.
Inconsistent Outputs & Unfulfilled Standards
Humans can do a wonderful job in many things. However, simple, repetitive tasks in the packaging line can be an area in which we don’t particularly excel. Manual packaging processes can often lead to bottlenecks within a production process when human errors occur. Humans can be slow and make mistakes every once in a while, no matter how well-trained your team is.
If you have standardised packaging requirements from clients, making sure that 100% of your outputs are adhering to the standards can be challenging. This is because inconsistencies and inaccuracies in your outputs frequently occurs when manual labour is involved, thus delivering unsatisfactory results. These simple errors can quickly add up to financial losses and create a ton of waste.
An automated packaging process can help to eliminate this bottleneck since a machine can be designed to consistently keep up with the flow and requirements of the production line. With machinery automation & robotics, there will be less scope for packaging errors, which in turn leads to less downtime and bottlenecks. They can reduce or even completely eliminate packaging material waste, as well as ensuring that each of the outputs are equally sized and weighed.
Conclusion
If you have any doubts, work with a packaging professional who has experience in helping businesses improve their efficiency with packaging automation. At Aurora Process, we can help you to identify the potential for improvement, cost reduction, and increased productivity with industrial packaging systems. We are specialists in end-of-line process equipment who have worked closely with a variety of clients and industries – including grain & seed, food & dairy, growers, stock-feed, fertiliser, and cement manufacturers. Get in touch with us today and discover how you can improve your processing lines.
