Crossroad Farms Dairy has the challenging task of distributing their dairy products across a variety of geographic locations within a reasonable — and safe — period of time. Dematic Corp. helped them find a solution to effectively accomplish their goal.
The challenge: safe fulfillment is no easy task
Manual palletizing is a difficult job under any circumstances. Palletize inside a freezer at temperatures of 0 to 10º F and your problems multiply. Crossroad Farms Dairy utilized eight people to manually palletize a variety of ice cream tubs, squares and novelties at their facility outside Indianapolis, Indiana. Staff turnover was excessive, workplace safety inside the freezer was difficult to maintain and product damage from handling, while not excessive, could be improved.
The solution: taking the ‘manual’ out of manual labor
Working inside the footprint of the existing freezer, Dematic engineers designed and implemented an integrated system to replace the manual palletizing function, using three articulating arm robotic palletizers. In addition to palletizing, it was important to maintain all operations inside the freezer while keeping core temperatures constant, thereby ensuring the highest quality standards.
The results are in
The innovative system designed by Dematic completely eliminates the need for any personnel to work inside the freezer during normal operations. The entire system is controlled from a "warm room" by one technician, via video cameras and real time system monitoring and maintenance software. Crossroad Farms Dairy is able to safely and effectively distribute product to desired destinations with significantly reduced risk to their employees.
