Case Study: North Side Foods

North Side super-sizes packaging value

Customer

North Side Foods Corp. of Arnold, PA, produces cooked sausage patties and links under the Ember Farms brand for a variety of foodservice accounts. In addition, under the McDonald’s brand, North Side packs cooked sausage patties for Oak Brook, IL-based McDonald’s Corp.

Problem

Until recently, North Side manually packed its products in waxed corrugated cases.

“We were the only national company on the cooked sausage side that didn’t have some type of sealed container inside a case,” says Ed Fornadel, key accounts manager. “With this change, we’re on a level playing field with our competitors.”

Solution

Now, a 2.25-mil polyethylene pre-made bag supplied by Bag Pack (Cincinnati, OH) is automatically filled with product, sealed, and placed in shipping cases that are taped automatically.

Erected cases are conveyed to a pair of thermal-transfer print-and-apply pressure-sensitive labelers from Paragon (White Bear Lake, MN). One labeler prints and applies a label on the side of each case. This label is preprinted with name and logo of the foodservice customer for whom the product is being packed. The Paragon labeler adds item-specific information such as ingredients and nutrition statements. The second labeler prints and applies a bar code label on the leading panel of each case. Foodservice customers scan the bar codes for information that helps them manage inventory as it moves through their system.