Saucecompany, along with a large part of the Dutch companies in the food processing industry, is faced with the challenge of a labor shortage. Many operations in which food is processed, sorted and packaged require manual labor. Costs are rising due to the scarcity of labor.
Working at Saucecompany is often physically demanding. Products are processed under low temperatures (cold-chain 4-7°C) to prevent loss in the chain and to guarantee quality. Employees often stand shoulder to shoulder doing the same work throughout the day, without moving from place to place. Production areas are continuously moist, due to maximum use of machines and high volumes. Due to hygiene requirements, smooth, cleanable surfaces are required. With the proliferation of machines, food processing environments are eminently noisy.
With the increasing labor costs, the general labor shortage and the decreasing availability and quality of seasonal labor, it is financially more interesting for Saucecompany to invest in automation and robotization. The most logical production line to focus at within Saucecompany is on the production of sauce sachets, at Saucecompany this forms a substantial part of the turnover. Mentally working at Saucecompany will become increasingly difficult. This is reinforced by increasing mechanization, which is aimed at automating logistics processes (crates, boxes, packaging), making the process more efficient and improving quality guaranteed. The result is that the remaining work is even more monotonous, short-cycled and repetitive. The work will also become increasingly data-driven and line-driven, so that work will be monitored and used as a payment method. This causes a lot of stress and failure in the sector. Due to the increasing multitude of new taste models, the diversity in factories has increased even more. This further increases the pressure on factories and packaging locations.
Saucecompany has asked COTEMACO to map out which activities are needed to optimize the process within the factory in the field of data, digitization and robotization, and to pay specific attention to the sachet lines because this is one of the top segments that is acted upon. and in detecting leakage on these lines and making the processing hands-free, the biggest challenge is in terms of margin of error combined with finding personnel. In the long run, Saucecompany intends to deploy cobots and/or robots to use the further process, if cost-effectively feasible, to solve the further challenges of an improved working environment for staff and more manageable and increased output.
