For sensitive products such as cookies, the journey from the oven all the way to the primary packaging machine can be quite a long and arduous one. The longer the transportation belt, the higher the risk for cookies to bump together and break. However, manufacturers can counteract product loss by investing in gentle handling solutions.
When handling crumbly cookies, biscuits and crackers, manufacturers can opt for one of two technologies or even combine them: pick-and-place technology or conveyor systems. Each of them is suitable for different tasks along the packaging line: while conveyor belt systems are often the technology of choice for distributing the product stream from the oven onto packaging legs, pick-and-place solutions are ideal for placing sensitive products from the transportation belt right into the primary or secondary packaging machine or onto the infeed belt of flow wrappers or vertical baggers. Seeing how many manufacturers also work as contractors, product and format changes are frequent and need to be performed efficiently to keep downtimes to a minimum. Both technologies cater to this need, as many pick-and-place solutions and conveyor systems are suited to handling a variety of different products and formats.
