When it comes to food packaging, it is no surprise that retailers struggle to get products to the checkout lane. Today, fresh foods lead sales within most grocery departments, so it is important to find the best ways to quickly get them from bulk to the shopping basket. Packaging innovations like automatic wrappers can boost any backroom production and help businesses save on costly labor.

Automatic wrappers are customizable workstations that assist the operator and simplify food handling. Consider challenges like food safety, shelf life, labeling requirements and staff training. All of these tasks are mini-hurdles that can block the route that a product takes on its way to a sale. Automatic wrapping can replace manual wrapping and reduce staff time spent on training and quality control. The automatic wrapper also makes efficient use of space by eliminating the sprawl of materials such as film rolls, tape, scales, trays and labelers.

Automation frees up labor that is better focused on less-repetitive tasks. Repetitive wrapping operations can cause staff fatigue, resulting in product flaws and quality loss as well as an increased risk of safety issues. High-quality automatic wrappers take portioned products and weigh, wrap, secure and label, as fast as 35 packages per minute.

Increasing packaging speed helps businesses meet consumer demands and creates a bigger production capacity for retailers. Consider sales trends that favor ready-to-cook meals with multiple ingredient groupings. The combination of food items in these packages are difficult to assemble, yet they are increasingly desirable for busy consumers that opt for a variety of fresh foods. After the product is placed on the tray, the wrapper quickly does the rest, releasing a compact package that is pleasing and easy for the customer to handle.

Automatic wrappers secure a stable weight, and swiftly stretch, wrap, fold and tuck film over each product. The label is applied as the fully wrapped package is discharged at speeds that would be impossible manually. The many steps to this process occur almost instantly, keeping nearby workstations clean and the quality of food packages consistently tidy and visually appealing.

Rice Lake Weighing Systems has a variety of automatic wrapping systems to make your packaging process flow easily, with tightly wrapped, uniform and ready-to-go packages.