Whether it’s pharmaceuticals, food, beverages, or small non-food items, there’s one thing nearly all industries have in common. They create products that will need to be packed for storage, distribution, and sale. With thousands of items needing to be wrapped, labelled, filled, and packed based specifically on their type, companies need a robust tool to help get the job done– that’s where a packaging machine comes in.
In this article, we will take a look at why packaging is important and how these amazing machines work.
What is Packaging?
Simply put, packaging is the process of encasing and protecting items or products for use, sale, distribution and storage.
There are a wide variety of different types of packaging materials available to use. According to the EPA, the most packaging containers and wraps are made from the following materials:
- Glass
- Steel
- Aluminum
- Paper and Paperboard
- Plastic
- Wood
Furthermore, most products are first packaged individually. Then they will be placed into larger units and repackaged again for wholesale or retail. The speed and quality of packaging directly impacts a company’s bottom line. That’s why they rely heavily on automation from packaging machines. Let’s take a look at how packaging machines work and a few of the most popular types used today.
Packaging Machines Explained
Packaging machines are heavy-duty equipment that’s used to package items and components. The specific type of machine will be based on the product being packaged. For instance, if it’s a liquid product, then the machine can fill and cap the containers it’s placed in. However, they also perform other business-critical tasks such as item counting, coding, labelling, handling, and more.
Many Packaging Machine Manufacturers offer both automatic and semi-automatic machines and can even assist their customers in developing robust, efficient supply packing lines and provide support such as troubleshooting issues or supplying spare parts. Let’s take a look at some of the key benefits of using a packaging machine.
The Benefits of a Packaging Machine
Looking at data provided by Consumer Report, packaging cost manufacturers around $150 billion every year. Packaging is an important part of industry, so let’s see why packaging machines are so useful.
1) They Increase Productivity and Efficiency.
This is hands down the best benefit from packaging machines. They can quickly push out thousands of wrapped and packed items a day. What’s more important is they can let you quickly adjust your production rate based on demand levels.
2) Improve Quality Assurance
Another perk of having a machine do the job is they do it the same way every time. Packaging machines remove that inherent inconsistencies due to human nature. You can be certain that the next product coming out is identical to the last one.
3) Liberate Workers from Tedious/Repetitive Tasks
Most workers are dissatisfied working mundane tasks over and over and often want something more fulfilling. And businesses need to pay them a livable wage which eats into profits. Packaging machines free up workers to take on more important tasks, while reducing the overall labour cost for the company.
