Send the peanuts packing. Automated Packaging Systems, headquartered in Streetsboro, is on a roll with innovative packaging materials that replace messy, space-consuming foam peanuts.
Almost 50 years ago, Automated Packaging Systems invented the AutoBag, a bags-on-a-roll machine that packages products into plastic bags at high speeds. The company culture of fostering innovation and creativity continues today.
“Your competition is not going to stand still,” says chief financial officer Daryl Manzetti. “You have to be on the edge, thinking down the road. You have to be looking for new applications, new markets, new ways of doing things.”
That philosophy has recently produced several innovative products that help customers increase productivity and reduce costs. Some inventive ideas have come from customer requests. More often, they’ve come from the creative employees in the company’s custom engineering department.
Two of the company’s newest protective packaging products, AirPouch FastWrap (think Bubble Wrap) and the AirPouch Express 3 void-fill air pillows (think doll-size clear plastic pillows), actually come folded flat in boxes, not on bulky, pre-inflated rolls. Because the products are inflated only as needed, the boxes pack more materials and take up less space.
“One small box of air pillows actually equates to a roomful of peanuts,” says Manzetti.
Compared to similar systems that use rolls, the FastWrap box holds 10 percent more material and each air-pillow box holds 33 percent more. The box helps customers maintain productivity levels and keep storage costs down.
Chris Rempe, (pictured at left) the company’s senior product manager, says the company’s goal is to come up with ways to market that don’t involve price. Because Automated Packaging Systems makes both the machines that do the inflating and the materials that are used as protective packaging, it has multiple avenues for innovation.
“We’re always looking for ways to innovate both of those components in the system, whether that’s coming up with biodegradable or recycled material,” Rempe says.
On the machine side, going “knifeless” — a change the company took to market less than two years ago — has been a major selling point. Older machines would use a knife to cut the material to create an opening for the air. Automated Packaging Systems now uses an engineering design that makes a vertical perforation instead.
“Once a knife dulls, it can cause jamming and is a leading source of downtime,” Rempe explains. “With our machine, you don’t have to stop packing to change the blade, so we’re faster than most machines. Think of an Internet commerce company that has thousands of boxes to send out in a day.”
EZ-Tear perforations, a design on both the FastWrap and Express 3 air pillows, add to that productivity. Instead of a continuous perforation across their width, the pillows or pieces of wrap come out of the machine already separated except for about an inch of perforation on each edge, making it simple for the machine operator to grab the pillow or wrap and tear it off. That keeps the packing line moving.
The honeycomb pattern on the FastWrap gives more reliable protection by transferring air throughout the material once it’s inflated. It takes away some of the poppable fun, but if air is squeezed from one cell, it will transfer into surrounding bubbles. Such a design more reliably protects the product that’s wrapped in it.
One of the company’s most recent attention-getters is a new line called EarthAware. Its air pillows are made of a completely biodegradable material, a big boost over environmentally unfriendly packing peanuts. A second product is made entirely of recycled materials. Rempe says sustainable products are often important to the customers of Automated Packaging Systems’ direct clients.
“When the customers at home see that the company that they order from is using a biodegradable void fill or a void fill made from recycled materials, they appreciate that,” Rempe says.