Rovema @ PACK EXPO Connects

Do you shop the same way that you did five years ago? 

Do you buy the same products? New capital equipment is often carefully designed for today's market expectations and your current production needs which are based on the current needs and expectations of your customers and retailers. 

What’s often overlooked is how you plan for tomorrow's demands.

How do you anticipate them? How do you purchase capital equipment today with the flexibility needed to adapt to changing market conditions and timeless reliability that you can count on through these transitions?

First, let’s talk about flexibility. And as we unpack these topics, if you’re curious about any of the capabilities or if any of the features we address pique your interest, hop in the chat to get connected with an expert. 

Packaging machinery built for today’s and tomorrow’s market expectations is delivered by engineering agility into your system. 

So what is agility? 

First of all, it's the current flexibility of the machinery that you purchase. To simplify, here are some examples of Rovema equipment features that allow for versatility in an array of packaging choices you make. 

The first is changeover efficiency and recipe repeatability. As you’ll see demonstrated on our BVC flex machine, our easy tooless changeover from a simple pillow bag to a RoPack doy style stand up pouch not only makes it easy for smaller companies to use the same packaging machine for multiple package types, but this is also a great tool for large scale testing of new package types as well.

Now it’s one thing to have the capability to form different bag types, but it’s just as important that the seal quality, weight accuracy and film tracking is excellent as you transition between recipes. Rovema’s flexibility is built on a foundation of repeatability. 

By using tools like our automatic film tracking and an award winning HMI with excellent recipe functionality, the repeatability of changeovers can stay consistent through years of production. 

The second example of current machine agility, is the ability to run different film materials.  Rovema’s patented “Premium Seal” technology coupled with our D-motion sealing allows you to maximize the dwell time of the sealing process as well as integrate two different sealing pressures in one cycle.

By using completely servo driven seal jaws with no reliance on springs to drive force, the jaws can apply very light pressure to thicker films to preheat the inside sealant layer before applying full pressure. 

Everything from the dwell times, sealing force, difference in sealing cycles and the heat can be fully adapted to the requirements of each film type and saved for each recipe. 

When we talk about long term flexibility of your machinery, a large driver of change is new innovations that  debut 5 , 10 or even 20 years after your machine has been in production. 

Because Rovema machines are built with no end-of-life, we are intentional about trying to make retrofitting possible for as many of our innovations as we can for prior machine models. Upgrades to safety, film handling, and shelf life extension capabilities continue to be made available as they are added to new machines as well. 

You know, it sounds good to talk about nuts & bolts, mm & inches, and BPM, but what does it actually mean for your business? 

Every year, we navigate a variety of different changes with our customers, from material changes driven by sustainability deadlines, shelf life requirements and new customer opportunities. 

Imagine if marketing and engineering teams could belly up to the conference table together without hesitation to tackle these changes? 

These teams have different ways that they measure success of their packaging projects, and both are incredibly important. Engineering wants to run product predictably and efficiently while Marketing teams want to differentiate their products and meet customer expectations. 

Unique package styles and materials vs predictable machine performance goals should not feel like a horse trade for VFFS projects. 

Machine flexibility bridges the perceived gap and for your business, it means. (Bullets that pop up)

• The ability to take new customers with different package requirements
• It means having a competitive edge by rapidly adapting to retailer, consumer and market expectations
• It means the ability to reduce costs by implementing new technologies
• And it means balancing production easily between different segments like food service and retail

Now you may be asking yourself, “these short and long term flexibility perks sound nice, but how long, how rugged and how “modern” is my machine going to feel?” 

You know, we’ve all seen the movie.. You spend months building out your new packaging equipment and it shows up shiny and new and the operators and maintenance teams are excited to run it. Everyone gets trained on the technical capabilities, the PM’s and they’re handed the proverbial keys, ready to rock and roll.. 

But then not too far down the road the third shift line leader takes a first shift job somewhere else. Then purchasing starts buying cheaper spare parts that the vendor promises are exactly the same, and then maintenance skips a couple of PMs because budgets are tight and they are short-handed and then planned downtime for the electrical rebuild gets postponed because the main production equipment takes priority over the packaging equipment. 

It may not be in that particular order, or exact timeline of events but whether it's three months, three quarters or three years later the machine isn't running as well. It's not like it stopped, it's just not great. Let's call it 90%. 

Well, then the second shift supervisor leaves, the compressor starts to fail, and there's more water in the airlines, the voltage fluctuations become more frequent in the plant. And before you know it a couple more years later and you're at 80% capacity. 

Your new norm is that the machine needs more TLC after being rode hard and put up wet, but it doesn’t happen. It's like the frog that slowly boiled without realizing it, the machine eventually and needlessly only runs at a portion of capacity, and nobody really fully realizes it. 

So the question is, if it's so predictable and common, how do we prevent it? Why do we accept it?

The analogy sounds kind of funny but this really is serious business. 

Let me give you some symptoms of the gradual decline that you may have noticed on your bagger. The first is a drop in film tracking consistency, which is often caused by dirty or seized up guide rollers, belts or vacuum itself. 

The second symptom is uneven, or inaccurate fill weights, due to improper lubrication processes. This is often caused by the auger column jack becoming seized up from improper lubrication processes, so manufacturers just stop using it to manage the drop height of their charges. 

Another symptom, particularly from buying non OEM parts, is that the parts don't hold up to the requirements of the machinery. So we’ve seen multiple instances of warped auger screws, improperly fitting belts and overall waste of time with more frequent spare part changes. 

The symptoms are easy to point out but how do you avoid them? 

First, let’s talk about the partnership responsibilities of the owner and the vendor. Your role as the owner will sound simple. 

And while it is, some of these actions are the most important. The first is consistent preventative maintenance- making sure that proper cleaning and inspection happen on a consistent basis. 

The second is training- in order to make sure that those processes are maintained and performed correctly.

 And the third is to ensure that your spare parts are built to withstand the specifications and performance of your machine. 

Now, just as important is your vendors role. Your packaging machinery vendor should be setting you up for success with the support and resources needed to maintain the consistency of your pm practices, and adequate training of your employees. 

They should also have a deep supply of spare parts inventory on hand to quickly support customer issues, with the financial resilience to maintain this inventory through seasons of market downturns. 

Also, on the topic of financial strength, it is important to have a machine partner that has a strong Balance Sheet. If these turbulent times have taught us anything, it is that well run and financially strong businesses are as vital as the machines they build.

PM’s and ongoing vendor support is crucial. But so are the technologies built in that are more conducive to longevity.

The first is fully servo-driven seal jaws. We went into great detail on how they lend themselves to package and material flexibility, but because the sealing system has no reliance on momentum from springs, they drastically cut down on the wear of the sealing system, and overall vibration of the machine.

Another innovation that’s conductive to machine longevity is the overall accessibility of the machine components, which we will demonstrate here. 

As you’ll see, you’ve got great accessibility of the machine cabinet and also the seal jaws swivel open to allow for easy cleaning.

For packaging equipment manufacturers, engineering machine flexibility and longevity doesn’t happen by accident, there are 3 key mindsets that you should be thinking of when kicking the tires on a machine builder. 

The first is an adaptability mindset - does the machine manufacturer proactively suggest considerations and engineer in simple, inexpensive details now to facilitate adaptations later?

The second is a Support mindset - is the machine manufacturer focused on bending steel and pushing more out the door this quarter? Or supporting ongoing optimized production long term - education, spare parts, retrofits, changeovers, engineering, etc.

The last is a Market mindset - is the manufacturer focused on responding to shifting expectations and requirements, to innovating in their space?

Purchasing capital equipment is a critical business decision with a lot of moving parts. At the end of the day, investing in an asset with an ROI and total cost of ownership that you can hang your hat on is supported by pillars of smaller factors like the ones we covered today of machine flexibility and longevity. 

If any of these issues we covered today are preventing you from getting the maximum efficiency out of your machine, or you think one of these technical advances can help you change your business, hop in the chat and one of our experts can help you. 

Thank you for your interest in Rovema, we hope you truly sense our passion for packaging. Enjoy Pack Expo Connects and we will see you on the next one.

If you’re a coffee manufacturer, you’ve got a tough job. 

You carefully source and roast what 64% of adults in the US have to start our day off on the right foot. 

And factors like weight accuracy, degassing, retail vs food service packages, all add tremendous complexity to an already labored process with a bunch of “finger-in-the-air” critics with lots to say about everything you do.

HI, my name is Emily Brogan the Marketing and Sales Coordinator for Rovema North America.

We know that the production and packaging of coffee poses a unique set of challenges. And as a Marketer, I know that your priorities are different depending on the priorities of your customers. 

For your standard retail whole bean and ground coffee products, your general input costs like packaging and overhead, your production speed and the shelf life of your products are your driving forces for the decisions you make every day. 

Some of your customers prioritize consistency and may have been purchasing the same red or blue tub for decades, while some of them reach for exotic beans or adventurous flavors. 

Whatever their expectations, you strive to meet them in the most effective and efficient way possible.

Now, if you produce foodservice coffee products like fractional packs, this competitive segment requires you to focus on maximizing your production speeds at blistering rates while balancing seal integrity. 

Your food service customers demand fresh, high quality products at a very low price. 

This is a saturated and competitive market and the slightest inefficiencies can have major margin detractions.

Honestly it’s easy to find the challenges, but harder to find solutions. 

When it comes to your coffee packaging equipment, every model and every vendor has their maximum speeds spec’ed out based on the perfect product, with all the stops pulled out. but let’s be real, this isn’t Eden. 

There are variables that come into play that often start chipping away at your expectations for your machinery. But why? 

How do we engineer packaging machines to compensate for less-than-perfect coffee products? 

I’m going to give you a couple of examples and if these are factors and solutions that hit home for you, chat in and connect with us so that we can give you more information.

The first- take ground dark roast coffee. 

Because of it’s nearly non-existent amount of moisture left from the roasting process, it is incredibly light and dusty, and the amount of kick back or string out that can result from a less-than-ideal drop height can compromise your seal integrity when bagging at high speeds. 

This causes frac pack producers in particular major slow down in their production speeds compared to lighter roasts. 

Having the ability to adjust the drop height with an adjustable filling tube column jack that comes standard on our auger fillers is key to gaining back some of that slow down.

For your premium retail coffee products, you’ve likely invested in solid multilayer film that’s hopefully formed into a package style with steady stand up-ability and graphics that stand out on the shelf. 

But, are you having to crank back your speeds to get the seal integrity you need? Or, Maybe when I mention great stand-up ability, you feel a twinge that that’s not the case for your package? 

Take this Stabilo^® bag, for example. It has four full unobstructed panels by using this offset seal instead of if running along the back of the package. 

By also using these seals in each corner, it has sturdy stand up ability and holds up well to any shipping toil.

If you are already investing in and sourcing great coffee and great film, ensuring that you’re maximizing the product protection, speed, and shelf presentation for your products is a no-brainer. 

Rovema’s patented Premium Seal^® technology coupled with our D-motion sealing allows you to maximize the dwell time of the sealing process as well  as integrate two different sealing pressures in one cycle. 

By using completely servo driven seal jaws with no reliance on springs to drive force, the jaws can apply very light pressure to thicker films to preheat the inside sealant layer before applying force. 

This allows for wrinkle free, delamination-free welded seals that are considered the strongest in the industry. 

And by using D-Motion sealing as opposed to traditional rotary circular sealing, that amount of dwell time can be fully adjusted as well to the needs of your film. 

Another way of maximizing efficiency in tandem with achieving the highest quality seals and bag styles. 

Now, another factor you likely worry about, regardless of your package style, market or coffee product, is oxygen, which is enemy number one for your products, whether it’s getting in through leaky seals or you have trouble getting it out in the first place. 

Rovema’s patented Premium Seal^® technology that we just showed you is going to solve your first issue of leakers, but for getting that oxygen out in the first place, let me dive in to Aroma Perm^®. If you’re gas flushing your products, why shroud the whole machine? 

Why not just put the entire facility in a bubble? Because Nitrogen ain't cheap. 

As you’ll see in this footage, by encapsulating the filling machine and gas flushing up through the auger and the horizontal feed screw, we are getting less than 1% oxygen in these packages and minimizing the amount of nitrogen used to get there. 

Another huge issue that I hear from my coffee customers is the amount of product they have to give away because their product weights vary drastically. 

While for some products the input cost may not seem like a big deal it becomes one when I point out just how much profit they are missing out on in opportunity costs when we apply our solutions to their business inefficiencies. 

Picture yourself going from 2% give away to getting within 1% of your declared net weight on your coffee frac pack line, meaning that at 140 packages per minute, you can get over 80 more packages out of the same amount of product you would run through in an hour. 

Just think about what translates to in a month or even a year? 

That’s a game changer.

Now we’ve talked a lot about standard features already today like the column jack and Premium Seal^®, but I want to show you this automatic check weigher that automatically shoots feedback to the auger. 

It constantly monitors products as they are coming from the bagger and if it detects a trend of incrementally over or underweight packages, it automatically adjusts the auger feed screw rotation slightly to correct the package weights. 

This completely eliminates the need to pull packages off of the line to weigh them and allows for an extremely self-sufficient packaging line during runs. 

By the way, on the topic of our Auger have you ever wondered why the Auger, the bagger and your end of line equipment have to be sourced from different manufacturers? More on that in a minute…

Hi I’m Dyan, technician at Rovema North America.

Those are cool innovations for the plant, but what about the rest of the supply chain? 

How are these innovations going to do anything for me if I’m in marketing or a project manager?

Well, first of all, let’s talk about game changing business opportunities, let’s talk about co-packing. 

Frankly we’ve heard it before, “Dylan, I don’t really care about going from 3 percent residual O2 to  less than 1 percent, we don’t get any complaints from the market and that’s just a waste of my hard earned dollars.”

I get that, but, what happens if you want to bid on a co-packing opportunity but you miss out on a year-long contract because you don’t meet their corporate quality specs? 

Another pinch point that you might be met with, that I want to point out now is if you still have the luxury of floor space to de-gas your ground coffee before packing. 

Let’s assume that all of the benefits on the production side are going to translate to happier customers and retailers, therefore, more sales. 

Eventually demand is going to start driving a lot of the efficiency decisions you’re gonna have to make. 

By using degassing valves and a bagger that can package grounds right from the roaster, you can get those products right into bags and  cases. 

Many of our largest customers are even using this tactic with their coffee frac pack lines, using coupon valves to allow them to package straight from the roaster and send the frac packs out the door. 

Now we mentioned the topic of packaging equipment and sourcing from different vs the same suppliers. 

Here at Rovema, yeah we build VFFS baggers, BUT over the last 60 years we learned a lot about the challenges our customers faced on the equipment up and down the line with filling, cartoning or end of line equipment and we got to work. 

We designed filling and end of line equipment to perfectly integrate, complement and hold up to the demands of our baggers. And that still stands today. 

The same engineers that build out the baggers for our customers manufacture the full packaging line from the ground up. This is really important to our customers that source their full lines from us. 

The most prominent one that they note is the simple fact that they don’t have to worry in the slightest that the components won’t play well together or even feel like an amalgamation of different techniques or engineering teams. 

We have heard plenty of horror stories of packaging line components simply not fitting together and adjustments having to be made that push a launch date back, that’s a nightmare,.

By designing and engineering these components together, there are several efficiencies we are able to add to the entire process- first during launch, you are able to have a single source FAT, single source project management, single source quoting , all of that good stuff but when we talk about the next 20 years- you’ll have the benefits of a single source for service and parts, any upgrades and let me show you some of the efficiencies for your operators:

Now this setup does not currently have it’s end of line component with it but it would run nearly the same.

With the integration, the operator will be able to manage the entire packaging line from one HMI, this is tremendous for the level of automation for your plant often with one operator running even multiple lines. 

Now we know this is such a new experience for you, trust me, I wish we could be with you in person having this conversation and give you this same hands on experience but just to demonstrate the accessibility of the contact surfaces while we are over here, let me show you how fast your team members are going to be able to get in here and clean out any oils, grounds and residual flavors between runs. It’s just that fast. 

Also, lets walk around the front: Here you’ll be able to quickly pull out the filling tube contact areas and also open up these seal jaws to be able to brush these out as well. 

For the coffee industry, again, we know that maximizing your efficiency and the quality of your packages is where these big margins are made. 

Making sure you are avoiding oxygen intrusion, and maximizing those speeds is the basis for all of the nuances of this entire solution behind me. 

If any of these issues we covered today are preventing you from getting the maximum efficiency out of your machine, or you think one of these technical advances can help you change your business, hop in the chat and one of our coffee packaging experts can help you. 

Thank you for your interest in Rovema, we hope you truly sense our passion for packaging. Enjoy Pack Expo Connects and we will see you on the next one.