Edible oil is a very competitive market category, essentially driven by product and brand differentiation and competitiveness through packaging cost savings, production efficiency, and permanent asset optimization. As a leading solution provider, Sidel has a strong heritage in edible oil, acting as a one-stop-shop partner to propose complete and integrated PET lines. The company’s strength is also based on their comprehensive portfolio of equipment capable of answering any request in terms of PET bottles, labels, caps, secondary packaging, footprint and line speeds along with ensuring an overall technical coherence, an adapted level of investment and an optimized return on investment (ROI).
Several trends are actively shaping edible oil producers’ production environment – product diversification and tough competition, asking for cost savings, are driving the industry. “Product diversification is bringing more product shapes, sizes and SKUs to handle for the producers. Therefore, the need for more flexible lines and equipment is rising,” says Francesca Bellucci, marketing director for the food, home and personal care market categories at Sidel, “regardless, whether we are talking about capital expenditures (CAPEX), operating expenses (OPEX) or total cost of ownership (TCO), all that nowadays matters to edible oil producers.”
Sidel offers assistance in the value chain to edible oil producers with engineering services for the line design and packaging design capabilities. Photo – SidelSidel’s 40-year heritage in PET packaging, coupled with its cutting-edge equipment, proves to be instrumental in helping producers active in this market segment to step up quickly. Sidel can provide edible oil producers with assistance very early in the value chain with engineering services for the line design and packaging design capabilities.
“Built into our very roots, our holistic approach to the edible oil industry contributes to delivering the right level of performance our customers need. At Sidel, we genuinely believe that achieving optimum quality and safety levels while lowering costs and optimizing assets along the line lifecycle is most easily achieved with a one-stop-shop partner,” explains Francesca Bellucci.
Secured performance and TCO with coherent, complete line solutionsÂ
Being a global solution provider for complete and integrated lines, Sidel can adapt every component of the line to fulfill edible oil producers’ expectations or specific needs perfectly.
Industrial turnkey line solutions with in-line PET bottle blowing are a promising approach to boost edible oil producers’ productivity from the beginning to the end of the line due to a coherent process and flow management. A good example is Sidel’s partnership with BL Agro Industries, an Indian-based manufacturer of edible oils, for which Sidel has successfully provided over the past five years, three different lines with different approaches, challenges and objectives to bottle sizes, shapes, secondary packaging and line speed. “Sidel greatly supported us along the whole journey,” says Ashish Khandelwal, executive director at BL Agro. “Relying on a single supplier who takes the full line responsibility, including packaging, was a great help, especially because whatever we produce must adhere to the highest quality standards.”
Sidel design expertise helps the Indian edible oil company to set new packaging standards. Photo – SidelFor Sidel as well as for BL Agro, line control and automation are at the heart of the system, ensuring the continuous running and the overall performance of the line. “In terms of efficiency, we are now reaching 98.5% on our first line, running at 24,000 bottles per hour (bph) with our small format bottles and 97.6% on our second one at 6,000 bph for the big containers. Our third line is currently being ramped up, but we fully trust to achieve efficiency up to 90% in two- or three-weeks’ time,” explains Ashish Khandelwal.
Single supplier with large portfolio adapted for every needÂ
Sidel has an in-depth knowledge at each step of the line with leading-edge equipment and state of the art technology.
On the wet part of the line, capabilities in blowing, filling, capping and labeling have to be available for every need or speed to address the various market demands. This has also been the case for BL Agro over the past years – From stand-alone blowers being able to manage small bottles at high speed or large bottles with the creation of notches for the insertion of a handle, up to Combi blowing, filling and capping solutions to reduce space and minimize the risk of cross-contamination, Sidel have expressed the breadth of their blowing capability at BL Agro packaging facility.
Sidel’s portfolio also guarantees various options for labelers, supporting wrap around or pressure-sensitive labels as well as bottle or pack or pallet conveyors and accumulation tables.
End-of-Line solutions: Flexibility at all levels
The end-of-line solutions, that is, the packing, shrink-wrapping and palletizing solutions, are also a critical part of the complete line, especially when it comes to SKU multiplication and flexibility required to pack them.
“For our 200 ml, 500 ml, and 1 L bottles, we use American boxes (RSC), while for our 2 L and 5 L bottles, we use Wrap-Around blanks,” explains Ashish Khandelwal. Sidel has installed a case erector, a vertical robotic packer and a case gluer, answering the need of RSC. At the same time, for the two other lines with two drastically different levels of speed, BL Agro chose Cermex WB46 intermittent case packer for the low-speed line and VersaWrap continuous packer for the most recent high-speed line.
Equally significant next to answering the operational needs with the right level of technology, Sidel has been able to adapt and support BL Agro with the expected level of investment or CAPEX.
“We are happy to have found a complete line solution under one roof. Our production costs have been drastically reduced. Perhaps we are one of the most efficient in the industry in terms of hygiene as well as operational efficiency,” concludes Ashish Khandelwal. Â
