Delivering the smallgoods

AusFresh is one of Australia's leading antipasto manufacturers and distributors. Established in 1994 as a small operation by the late Fermo Marchetti, a pioneer in Australia’s continental smallgoods trade, it supplies retailers, wholesalers and food service vendors around Australia.

Despite sending high volumes of goods nationwide, AusFresh was still hand-labelling cartons until recently.

Leo Soccio, AusFresh’s general manager, explains: “We were printing labels on a desktop printer, then putting two on each box – front and side – to suit our requirements.

“It was very manually intensive. One person would print anywhere from 5,000 to 7,000 labels a day with product information and TUN barcodes. But they couldn't just set up the printer and walk away - they had to stand there and remove the printed rolls and wind them manually. Otherwise the labels would be all over the floor.

“They’d then hand those labels to somebody else, who would apply the batch code and use-by date using a date-gun because the desktop printer couldn’t do that part.

“There were several manual processes in all that — and none of them was efficient.”

On top of that were human-error risks.

“This could be either the wrong label being printed or a label changed accidentally, such as someone using a permanent label set-up to create a temporary one, but saving the temporary one over the top, so the next person comes along and prints off a whole lot of labels, but they’re wrong," says Soccio.

Everything else we do is highly professional, so it really was overdue to bring labelling into line.”

AusFresh agreed to install a FOX IV carton print and apply system, iDSnet integration software, and iDSnet Portal from Matthews Australia. The coding specialist then integrated the FOX IV and AusFresh’s existing Bizerba labeller.

 Matthews now also represents the Bizerba range of check weighers, check-weigh labelling systems, weigh-price labelling systems and metal detectors.

“The FOX IV sits at the end of the packing line, just before the taping machine prints and applies labels to adjacent sides of the carton. I’ve never seen quality and reliability such as on that coder. It’s great," says Soccio.

“And iDSnet and the iDSnet Portal just make everything so easy. Rather than the operator going to the machine to select what they have to do, they can do it via the portal from wherever they are - even using a mobile phone. We’re using it to select a label for our packaging, our trays, our product, and it also selects the label for the carton. It’s wonderful, and it means we’re highly accurate.”

iDSnet selects the required label and automatically provides best-before data. It also monitors the Bizerba’s status.

“The final link will be to integrate the SSCC pallet labeller, so the iDSnet Portal will do everything. It’s so easy to use,” he adds.

Before choosing the solution, Soccio researched other options.

“But there was just no comparison with the machines: this FOX IV is more compact and much easier to use," he says.

“Also, I chose Matthews because of their reputation. I’ve never used Matthews before this, but I just know that in the industry that they’re the best. I met Lester [Nichol, Matthews’ MD] too. From him down, the staff are outstanding.”

Soccio says, on top of the automation improving accuracy, AusFresh has also achieved big productivity gains.

“We’ve saved a person a day between the two functions of the person at the printer and the one overprinting with the date-gun," he says.

“Not only is that a far better use of labour, it’s reduced the pressure. If a box is not labelled, that product has to come off the line – but it has nowhere to go, so we’d have to stop the line, losing productivity.

“Everything is integrated. We can do up to 7,000 labels per day, knowing it’s accurate and the best use of our resources.”

Soccio says commissioning the solution was smooth and hassle free.

“Commissioning the machine, and the assistance we got from Matthews in all of it, was above and beyond what I expected. They just took care of everything.

“I thought we’d be more involved in commissioning, but they just wanted the information and data, and looked after the rest. They had people here to hold our hand well beyond what I thought they would. Most companies would probably hang around for an hour, and go. Matthews spent a day here -then came back the next day.

“And the staff, no matter whether they’re the tech people, the software people, whoever… everybody knows what’s going on. It made such a difference.”