Case Study: Snack Manufacturer Expands with tna Packaging Lines

Quality snacks manufacturer and co-packer Keystone Food Products has expanded production capabilities at its Easton, Pennsylvania site, by adding three new tna packaging lines. 

Keystone produces a wide range of foodstuffs, including bakery items like cheesecakes, chocolate and mousse cakes.

The installation has also helped to consolidate Keystone’s work space, enabling it to better respond to increasing consumer demand for the company’s quality products and services. tna supported the family-owned business throughout the entire installation process in creating complete start-to-finish packaging solutions and facilitating Keystone’s transition to a new building with total peace of mind.

Flexible solutions for expanded capabilities

As a producer and co-packer of a wide variety of natural and healthy unique corn-based snacks, Keystone depends on flexible, high performance packaging solutions that can easily be integrated into its existing production line. The growing market requirement for smaller bag sizes meant Keystone needed to expand the plant’s manufacturing capabilities to address this customer demand while still maintaining profitability.

Keystone knew that the tna robag® FX 3ci was the right choice for its facility as this turnkey packaging system could be easily integrated with existing equipment thanks to tna’s comprehensive project management services. With performance improvements of up to 30 per cent in both output and the reduction of rejects, this state-of-the art packaging system also significantly increased the speed and precision of the entire production, helping Keystone to optimize performance while catering to the demand for smaller bags.

Accuracy at its best

Keystone is responsible for the packaging of both – its own and other brands’ premium snacks. As such, the company needed a highly accurate weighing system that would ensure that only the exact amount of product would be included in the bag.  This would avoid raw material waste and allowing Keystone to produce an increased number of units from the same quantity of material, also enabling it to deliver the best Return of Investment to their customers.

The tna intelli-weigh® omega 314 proved to be the most effective solution to Keystone’s challenges. By combining strain gauge load cells with digital filtering to virtually eliminate the influence of external vibration, the tna intelli-weigh® omega 314 allows for high speed weighing with superior precision.  As a result, discrepancies between bags are negligible, enabling Keystone to deliver the quality standards and profit margins its customers expect.
Improved product verification

Keystone’s commitment to product excellence and innovation is industry renowned. The company required a more automated verification system to enable it to stay at the forefront of innovation and maintain these premium quality standards.

tna quickly identified the solution and installed its intelli-read® 3    ̶  a revolutionary barcode scanner that enabled Keystone to maintain rapid packaging speeds while ensuring that its products are checked to the highest standards. The solution automatically scans the bar code on the film and cross checks it to verify that the correct product is being processed.

Maximizing plant footprint

Keystone wanted a system that would increase its production capacity in the limited space that was available. Because the previous production set up was fragmented, an important part of the installation process was to analyze the arrangement and provide more continuity in the way Keystone’s equipment was laid out.

Throughout the entire process, tna applied a flexible approach, closely listening to Keystone’s challenges and specific requirements to devise a fully engineered solution to maximize the use of space. Previously, each of Keystone’s machines had its own platform, which used significant amounts of valuable floor space. By providing its complete project management services, in the design and installation of a single new platform that would incorporate the three new packaging machines, tna was able to optimize the plant’s surface area, allowing Keystone to save both time and space.

Another key challenge was to adapt the layout to the plant’s low ceiling height. New machines were specifically tailored to meet space requirements and facilitate product transfer between different packaging stages. Before they could be packaged downstairs, light corn products were washed in the upstairs station. The lack of space however, meant that conveyors could not be installed. The tna intelli air® was the perfect fit for the situation. This distribution system has a small footprint and gently transports bags and other light weight packed products along a bed of air. It automatically discharges empty packets for optimal output and has flexible configuration plus several layout options.

The tna hyper-detect® metal detector also enabled Keystone to maximize the available floor space.
“Over the years, we have developed a strong relationship with Keystone,” comments Toby Steward, Regional Sales Manager at tna. “For the installation to be successful, we spent a lot of time with Keystone to get a good grasp of both their current and future plans. Once we fully understood their needs, we were able to tailor our systems to their specific requirements, providing them with flexible, high performance solutions that will meet their long term production needs,” Steward added.

“Increasing our production capacity was a priority for us, but we were also looking for innovative and efficient solutions that would be flexible enough to fit our limited space”, comments Bill Corriere.