Company: Newell Brands
Industry: A family of over 100 brands and 227 sites around the world across several industries
Headquarters: Atlanta, Georgia
Employees: 32,000+
Website: www.newellbrands.com
Newell Brands has had a 10+ year relationship with LINC Systems to increase efficiency and production with high caliber conveying and packaging processes and equipment. A manufacturer of a wide variety of products from Rubbermaid® and Sistema® food and beverage storage solutions to Ball® food preservation products, Newell relies on LINC Systems to provide equipment and expertise for conveying products, as well as feeding and filling, labeling, shrink bundling and packaging those products for shipment.
Throughout the years, Newell Brands’ engineering and operations teams have worked with LINC Systems on designing and implementing systems to move product around the plant, pack and label it, and ready it for protected shipment. Newell Brands has teamed with LINC on design and installation of equipment and products for shrink wrapping, labeling and product packing, conveying, plus stretch wrapping of finished products and pallets for shipment.
Mike Dobson, Senior Process Engineer of Newell Brands, shares his perspective of Newell Brand’s relationship with LINC Systems, “One of the leading things we like about LINC is that they deal with the machine brands we prefer - ProMach, Texwrap, Tekkra. There are specific machines that we prefer for some of our processes. Plus, they're very familiar with what we do. Not only with our core lines, which run at a high volume and involve more automation, but with our specialty lines as well. They understand what’s needed for these lines that are not as high volume, such as some of our craft jars, and they require more manual labor and more flexibility.”
Business Need
Newell Brands has a focus on sustainable innovation and forward-thinking products and solutions driven by a commitment to continuous improvement. With that in mind, some of Newell’s requirements for their business and their suppliers are:
Improved Production: Implementing automation to improve production with the existing workforce.
Improved Performance: Upgrading equipment and regular equipment maintenance to help improve performance and decrease downtime.
Knowledge of Preferred Equipment: Newell engineers prefer certain brands of equipment for specific applications and wanted a supplier that was knowledgeable about them. For example, Newell process engineers prefer Tekkra in-line wrappers for a two-roll shrink film application because they're servo driven, can handle some higher speeds and they’ve had good results with them.
Trusted & Collaborative Partnership with Supplier: It’s important for Newell Brands to have a collaborative relationship with suppliers they can trust. Ten years of collaboration with LINC Systems has provided the team at Newell Brands trust in LINC’s knowledge of their processes and the ability to design solutions that meet their goals. This also comes with peace of mind knowing that LINC’s service technicians will properly maintain the equipment after installation.
Issues
Newell Brands wanted to improve their packaging operations and reached out to LINC Systems for solutions to these challenges:
- Inability to convey a wider range of product sizes
- Labor shortage and reliability issues
- Machine downtime
Solutions
Installation of ProMach Shuttleworth Integrated Conveyor System
Working in tandem with Shuttleworth and the Newell Brands engineering team, LINC Systems designed, implemented and installed a new conveyor system capable of filling, labeling and packaging differing product sizes and shapes. LINC reps accompanied Newell engineers to the Shuttleworth manufacturing facility to ensure their equipment was the right solution. And once the project commenced, they visited the facility together to check up on the progress. After installation of the new integrated conveyor system, the production line runs faster and they don’t have to run certain products off-line.
"In our installation of the Shuttleworth conveyance system, there was a good collaborative effort between our company, LINC Systems and Shuttleworth. We would have meetings frequently to go over details and layouts and changes, and LINC was very responsive to what we needed. We’ve had a good partnership with LINC for over 10 years now. It’s a collaborative relationship with a trusted company that understands our business, our processes, and knows what we’re looking for."
– Mike Dobson, Senior Process Engineer, Newell Brands
Installation of Tekkra Shrink Bundling System
To improve productivity and decrease downtime, Newell Brands decided to upgrade their shrink-wrapping equipment. This met several objectives: to take advantage of automating tasks and reallocating that labor elsewhere, to increase production and to decrease machine downtime. The process engineers at Newell Brands worked with LINC Systems’ reps to design a specific solution with Tekkra to meet production specifications. The equipment upgrade allowed a faster run time by automating filling and wrapping operations and reduced downtime by half.
"When we're looking to upgrade equipment or if we need to add something on the line, we'll just call our rep at LINC Systems and see what they can work up for us – he's our go-to resource. He and the LINC team are very familiar with our business – not only our core, high-volume lines but also with our lower volume specialty products. And they understand what we're doing here or looking to do at the facility in the future. "
– Mike Dobson, Senior Process Engineer, Newell Brands
Collaborative Relationship with Exceptional Customer Service
The Newell Brands team appreciates the expertise that LINC rep, Dennis Malin, brought to the table and his collaborative approach to working on their full line integration with them and the equipment manufacturers. Once the system is installed, they know they can rely on LINC Systems for top-quality products and continued support to ensure the line is operating optimally.
Plus, regularly scheduled service visits by LINC technicians ensure their new and upgraded equipment is properly maintained and downtime is significantly reduced.
Whether you’re looking to improve productivity and safety with packaging automation or upgrade a current solution to reduce downtime, the team at LINC Systems is ready to help you design a solution for your unique needs. Our industry experts are ready to help you.
See the video of Newell Brand's packaging solutions in action:
For packaging, fastening and industrial supplies, LINC Systems is your total solution.
About LINC Systems
For over 35 years, LINC Systems has been serving the industrial manufacturing industry with fastening products, pneumatic tools, automated packaging solutions and industrial supplies. LINC Systems offers tool repair, equipment installation and safety training to help business work safely and productively.
Learn more at LINCsystems.com or call at 800.252.5894.