As with virtually every vertical segment in the manufacturing space today, packaging professionals are challenged to reduce costs, improve efficiencies and gain a competitive edge. This may seem to be a somewhat daunting task in light of other economic forces bearing down on the business – increased raw material costs, increased transportation expenses and shorter cycle times – particularly since many of these costs are either inflexible, subject to the whims of commodity markets, or vulnerable to fluctuations in the U.S. economy. Digital edition of supplement and research study are available.

Regardless of the cause, however, packaging professionals are increasingly turning toward information-enabled automation technologies to get the job done. “We’ve found that those organizations considered industry leaders are not only introducing more automation into the packaging process, they’re also ensuring that machines can communicate and share data both upstream and downstream on the line, as well as into the extended enterprise and supply chain,” says Craig Resnick, research director with ARC Advisory Group.

This bidirectional communication enables packaging equipment to proactively report real-time data, such as raw material consumption. This not only helps with forecasting when and how much raw material needs to be ordered, but it can also communicate with an organization’s procurement system and automatically trigger an order request. Such a system helps packaging professionals to accommodate day-to-day fluctuations in demand while eliminating both production-stopping raw material outages and unnecessary inventory storage expense.

Another key trait of industry leaders, says Resnick, is the ability to calculate and dynamically report overall equipment effectiveness (OEE) in real-time. Such functionality enables managers to identify problems which could impact the performance of a line, respond immediately to correct the situation (such as a jam upstream in the process), and return to the expected level of efficiency.

When asked “within the next five years, which automation and control system features are likely to become most important,” more than half (52%) of all respondents indicated “OEE,” with an additional 42% indicating that “human interface” would also be critical. The ability to capture, calculate and display information in real-time at the source delivers the immediate feedback necessary to improve processes and reduce costs related to unplanned downtime.

As any consumer-facing manufacturer can readily attest, contending with changes in customer preferences and reacting to product trends is one of the most challenging aspects of the job. Tastes change, form factors change, and keeping ahead of the competition often requires a combination of reinventing (or repackaging) top-performing products and ensuring that a continuous stream of new products are introduced to the marketplace. This requires both equipment and individuals on the packaging line to have the agility necessary to accommodate rapid shifts in demand.

One market condition driving greater need for agility is the ability of retailers to understand precisely what types of product are selling most briskly in what location. As point-of-sale (POS) systems continue to become more tightly integrated with corporate and enterprise management applications, retailers have far greater insight into sales activity than ever before.

Reaction to these shifts in demand will be pushed down the supply chain and manufacturers will need to fill orders with the right product, in the right quantity, at the right time to meet their obligations. According to research data, 38% of respondents indicated that their packaging lines require product changeovers several times per day. Another 18% indicated that changeovers occur at least once per day, while another 22% indicated that changeovers occur one to two times per week. Only 15% of respondents indicated that changeovers rarely occur or that they are dedicated to single-line packaging.

The most prevalent reason for line changeover, according to the survey, is production of a different or new SKU (61%), with changes in package size coming in a distant second (31%).