How a quality-conscious dairy company used MARKEM coding technology to support its product traceability process.

When it was founded in 1930, the company Centrale del Latte di Brescia quickly established a reputation for the quality and integrity of its products. These values have remained constant despite many changes to the company and its markets, and today its customers enjoy a comprehensive product range, produced in state-of-the-art processes.

From the very beginning, the primary aim of Centrale del Latte di Brescia was to provide daily distribution of milk products, guaranteed for their hygiene and quality. This has continued for almost 80 years, uninterrupted even by WW2, and has been reinforced by a commitment to innovation which has seen the company introduce new products and processes to meet changing consumer requirements.

Centrale del Latte di Brescia pioneered such developments as UHT long-life milk, yoghurt-based ice cream, PET milk bottling, and high quality fresh milk with a special nutritional content. In addition to traditional dairy goods, the company also serves its customers with fresh-cut salads and prepared fruit products. Throughout its range of products, Centrale del Latte di Brescia has invested in the technology required to guarantee production control standards, product identification and traceability, so that distributors and consumers alike can be certain of product quality and hygiene.

‘Right from the very start we have been committed to meeting the traceability guidelines in Italian and European food regulations’ commented Paolo Bonometti, the company’s Technical Director. ‘and the coding process is at the centre of managing this operation. ‘This initiative meant that we could meet the most exacting of distribution requirements and make it easy to manage order processing and inventory control throughout the supply chain. Packaged products are carefully identified, from consumer units to shrink-wrapped trays and pallet loads.

Centrale del Latte di Brescia found MARKEM to be a willing partner in developing a coding process to support its product identification and traceability goals. ‘Our collaboration with MARKEM has been a very positive one, especially in their ability to address the various coding issues involved’ continued Mr Bonometti. ‘Reliability and immediate technical support are essential qualities for our suppliers and MARKEM has always fulfilled our expectations through its helpdesk and technical assistance.

‘Another important factor was their ability to understand the application issues and develop tangible, practical solutions to overcome them. For instance, this happened with our mascarpone and Yo Gelè – a low calorie, low fat yoghurt ice-cream – production lines.

‘We needed to combine generic and variable product information on the pack, and we were able to use SmartDate thermal transfer coders to co-ordinate the real-time batch and expiry dates with the pre-printed data.’

The process is completely automated, eliminating many of the opportunities for human error, and the 300 dpi print quality of the SmartDate coders allows logos and graphics to be incorporated into the image design.

‘We worked with MARKEM to develop coding solutions for our end-of-line packaging’ explained Mr Bonometti. ‘Each customer has specific shipment requirements and we can meet all the different packing specifications – for shrink-wrapped trays, corrugated cases and pallet loads.’

Chipboard trays are coded using the MARKEM 5200 Hot Melt inkjet coder. This technology uses clean, solvent-free thermoplastic ‘ink’ to add high quality graphics, product details and 100% readable barcodes. Twin print-heads print simultaneously on both sides of the pack, allowing Centrale del Latte di Brescia to rationalise their packaging stocks by eliminating pre-printed materials.

The 5200 has few maintenance requirements and can be replenished during operation, giving exceptional levels of uptime and productivity.

Shrink-wrapped packs are automatically identified at speeds of up to 30 packs per minute using Cimjet 200 labellers fitted with ‘blow apply’ applicators to attach labels containing real-time product information, logos and barcodes.

This ‘print and apply’ technology is also used in the MARKEM 315P to label the adjacent sides