ITALPASTA LTD.
Automation Delivers Long-term
Production Efficiencies
CASE STUDY - ITALPASTA
ABOUT ITALPASTA
THE GROWTH CHALLENGE
Joseph Vitale’s lifelong passion for food was formed in his
mother’s kitchen in Bari, Italy when he was just a little boy.
He founded Italpasta in 1989 and since then, Italpasta
Limited has grown to become a premium manufacturer of
pasta in Canada. Italpasta is proud to be a leader in the
food service sector and the #1 retail pasta brand in Ontario.
Italpasta has always produced the best pasta possible by
proudly using only 100% Canadian Grade #1 Amber durum
semolina with protein levels of 13.2% - the highest standard
in the pasta industry. They select only product made from
the heart of the finest grade of wheat, rejecting any that
does not satisfy their very stringent specifications. Their
expertise and commitment to being a leader is unrivalled as
demonstrated by their continued SQF 2000 – Level 2
certification. And thanks to a dedicated team, including ten
“pastaios”- pasta specialists with a long tradition in their
craft, Italpasta continues to grow while maintaining their
commitment to best-in-class service, quality and customer
satisfaction.
As Italpasta continued its growth trajectory due to its
tremendous success, challenges with the packaging
process arose and needed to be addressed. Space in their
manufacturing plant became one of the biggest concerns.
Their original setup was short on foot print with no
additional room to grow. In addition, they wanted to
automate their pallet building to accommodate production
growth. In April 2010, Italpasta approached SSI SCHAEFER to
help streamline their packaging process. The solution
needed to work seamlessly with current manufacturing
process with minimal impact on operations.
Infeed Point
Interior Bridge
Exterior Bridge
FACTS & FIGURES
THE SOLUTION
Building Size:
Coming off the manufacturing lines, employees were manually
building pallets. In this same area, the storage of empty pallet
stacks and forklift traffic was impacting employee and food
safety issues. The SSI SCHAEFER solution was able to automate
and restructure this area. The result was an increase in
efficiency, better working conditions for staff as well as an
increase in the operating footprint by enabling Italpasta to
expand with more equipment.
• Manufacturing area approx. 90,000 sq. ft.
To implement the new equipment, Italpasta had to bridge the
manufacturing plant to the finished goods holding area, located
in the building next door, so that the Schaefer solution proposed
could seamlessly extend the packaging process. Once
construction of the bridge was completed, two case conveyor
lines were added directly connecting the 21 lines of packaging to
the case buffer area, where Italpasta sorts and stages cases for
palletization.
After the cases are conveyed over the bridge, they are buffered
and sent to one of four automated palletizing stations. At each
station, the machines palletize the cartons and auto shrink wrap
them, apply SSCC/GS128 code labels and prepare them for
storage until shunted to the distribution center.
• Packaging area approx. 30,000 sq. ft.
• Staging/holding area approx. 40,000 sq. ft.
System Size:
• Conveyor connected to 21 packaging lines
• Merging and elevating to second story level
• 2 Conveyors crossing a bridge from
manufacturing/packaging to staging/holding area
• 2 x 5 Lane buffer
• Conveyor sortation loop
• 4 x Case palletizers
SKUs:
• 750 SKUs
Cases/Day:
• Up to 5,500 cases per hour
Peak Time:
• Seasonal peaks from August – December
Working Hours/Shifts:
• 24 hours/day
• 3 shifts, 6 days/week
Productivity:
Prior to system installation: 800-900 cases/man*hour
After system installation: 1800-2000 cases/man*hour
Conveying System:
▲ Roller-Switch Diverter
▼ Palletizer
• Case conveyor and pallet conveyor
Handling Systems:
• Automatic case/layer palletizers
• Scales
• Label applicators
• Elevators
• Sortation
Software Solution:
• WAMAS© Material Flow Control (MFC) system
Transport units:
• Cases and pallets
HIGHLIGHTED OUTCOMES
► Increased efficiencies in tracing of packaged case/pallets.
► Created a bigger footprint for needed equipment to allow for
increased production.
► Reduced packaging errors.
► Eliminated bottlenecking with existing packaging equipment.
► Increased peak performance capacity.
► Improved employee and food safety by eliminating pallet
storage and heavy forklift traffic and therefore lowered costs
associated with employee compensation.
Pictured L – R: Frank DeMichino (Italpasta COO), Riccardo
Bordignon (Italpasta Plant Manager), Carmen Noori (SSI SCHAEFER
VP & Controller) and Joseph Vitale (Italpasta Owner & Founder)
“
► Improved employee skill level by transitioning from manual
labor to more skilled work.
THE RESULT
The implementation of the SSI SCHAEFER solution has
allowed Italpasta to double our production capability
producing more with increased efficiencies.
”
The solution from SSI SCHAEFER increased Italpasta’s
productivity by addressing the challenge of a limited footprint
and increasing overall efficiency while also serving to improve
employee & food safety.
– Joseph Vitale, Owner & Founder
SCHAEFER SYSTEMS INTERNATIONAL, INC.
SCHAEFER SYSTEMS INTERNATIONAL, LTD.
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Charlotte, NC 28273
Phone (704) 944 -4500
Fax (704) 588 -9094
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Phone (905) 458 -5399
Fax (905) 458 -7951
info@ssi-schaefer.ca
www.ssi-schaefer.ca
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