I recently visited the Mariani Fruits packing facility in Vacaville, Calif., about an hour east of San Francisco and about 45 minutes south of Napa Valley. The 1 million sq. ft. facility employs more than 450 people and serves as a regional storage and packing facility for Mariani dried fruits.
The event was organized by Formic Technologies Inc., and our hosts for the day were Joel Onyshuk, vice president of sales, and Saman Farid, founder and CEO of the Woodridge, Ill.-based company.
Founded in 1906, The Mariani Packing Co. was started by Paul Mariani and his wife, who bought an orchard and began a dried fruit business in the Silicon Valley region (long before the first computer company).
In 1919, Paul A. Mariani designed the first mechanized prune dehydrator which became the industry standard. In 1898, Mariani revolutionized the consumer packaged goods industry with the first stand-up bag featuring a resealable zipper and a clear window. Today, the company is one of the largest dried fruit producers in the world.
Mariani handles fruit with precision
The Vacaville facility features six packing lines, capable of drying and packaging all types of seasonal dried fruits. Based on the regions growing configuration, the largest throughput is attributed to raisins and prunes.
The key to Marianiโs quality control is in partially drying and storing harvested fruit, then reconstituting the fruit to the perfect moisture before packaging. This step ensures consistent quality for the end consumer.
The majority of the Vacavile facility’s floorspace is temperature and humidity-controlled storage of fruit for later packaging.
The packaging lines are decades-old hard automation designed to separate, weigh, and package the dried fruit. Human workers and machine operators tend every step of the process. According to a Mariani source, a line can be reconfigured in 30 minutes to run a different fruit and package.
Quality checks near the end of the line ensure that there is no metal contamination in each package and that each package is the proper weight. Underweight and overweight packages are separated from the line and then manually opened, and the fruit is recovered to be reintroduced back into the beginning of the packaging line, so that there is no waste.
One of the difficulties with packaging dried fruit is that the items like to clump, leading to overweight packages.
Formic helps Mariani at the end of the line
It is at the end of the line where Formic stepped in to install the first robotic automation for Mariani. A Formic palletizing workcell acquires the shipping boxes from the end of the line and neatly arranges them onto layers of the shipping pallets. An area vacuum gripper can acquire individual or multiple boxes, as needed, to assemble the pallet.
I was one of two press to attend the event, which was designed for customers. But the event was well attended and appeared to be a success, based on the conversations that I overheard and participated in.
Formicโs โfull-service automationโ model, which is its term for robots as a service (RaaS), is one reason why Mariani picked it. The advantages of avoiding capital expenses and guaranteed service level agreements (SLAs) helped to reduce the barriers to deploying the end-of-line palletizers.
Formic said it supports the installation 100%, but it has also trained the onsite Mariani technicians on how to troubleshoot and recover the workcells. This relationship has given the fruit packer confidence that automation can be successful.
Patrick Henson, Ruben Rangel, and David Wolper from Rumiano Cheese Co. also presented their use case for Formic end-of-line palletizing at the session. The needs of the cheese producer are more varied than those of Mariani, with dozens of different products that need to be handled, they said.
They said they were also happy to discover the advantages of the full-service automation model offered by Formic.
A new generation of automation suppliers
Formic is one of several organizations delivering robotics to end users as a service. The company is not a robot manufacturer, and it said it also provides more than a systems integrator.
This new breed of solutions organization is known as a robotics service provider (RSP).
Formic is currently focused only on end-of-line palletizing applications. This vertical solutions focus is one of the defining characteristics of an RSP.
Formic provides its technology via a subscription fee, which is contractually bound to measurable results defined in an SLA. Customers can return the systems if they don’t achieve the agreed-upon key performance indicators. Round-the-clock support is typically provided with the subscription fee.
Furthermore, the RSP is incentivized to continuously improve its systems’ throughput and capabilities while delivering preventative maintenance and upgrades that reduce the risk of missing an SLA. It’s a win-win for both the customer and the provider.
Across other automation verticals, there are other emerging RSPs such as MyGoat and ElectricSheep in the landscaping market.
Learn more about the RaaS model and full-service automation, and how companies like Formic are making automation affordable. Check out the upcoming webinar on Sept. 16 at 12:00 p.m. ET, titled: โRobotics for Small and Midsize Manufacturers.” Formic founder and CEO Saman Farid will be on the panel of industry experts discussing their solutions during the webinar. Register now.
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