Archives for November 2012

As we approach the Thanksgiving Holiday, I wanted to take a moment to thank all our clients for trusting Automatic Ice Systems to assist with your ice industry needs.  The entire AIS Team is grateful for the continued opportunity to be a trusted partner in our clients’ success.  We feel greatly blessed for the relationships that have been cultivated and the friendships that have been formed.  We hope to see many of you at the IPIA in Scottsdale, and to share our thanks personally.

Happy Thanksgiving,

The AIS Team

Instead of focusing on what we can sell and how we can sell it, we focus on total client development and support. 

One way to know that you have made it to the top is to listen to what your competition says about you.  If your completion speaks negative of your company, chances are that you have made it.  Negative selling is quite often used by sales people in a desperate attempt to capture business opportunities in which they are less qualified. Such desperate sales people have been known to spread rumors, refer to statements taken out of context, or even fabricate rumors to discredit the superior accomplishments of their competition.  When completion has them beaten, fabricating a false reality may be all they have.  So be careful of what you hear, even sales people that you trust can be guilty of such manipulation when their paycheck is on the line.

At AIS we take a different approach to market growth.  Instead of focusing on what we can sell and how we can sell it, we focus on total client development and support.  The focus of our regional managers, and the entire AIS team, is you and your company.  We seek to be an industry partner for our clients.  An integral component to the success and growth of your company, or in other words, we work for you!  When we approach a project opportunity, we analyze the best possible solution for each individual project.  We don’t steer a project in the direction of the greatest profit, but in the direction that will have the greatest positive impact on your company.  We put our diverse experiences and expertise to work for your company.  If we believe an opportunity is a poor decision for your company, we will express that concern, even if it means losing a project.  We will even recommend other companies for the job, at the expense of our own profits, if the recommendation is sound.

This culture of total client development and support translates into every aspect of our business model.  Not only does this approach hold true for major equipment project opportunities, but we follow this model throughout daily client support.  Packaging products, and our associated partner manufactures, work with us to provide better performing, more constant packaging products at the highest level of customer service.  Sure we could make more money selling lesser products, but what would be the negative impact on our clients?  The same holds true for the Leer Brand Ice Merchandisers we represent and the equipment parts inventory we maintain.   Our focus is on your company’s success.

It’s not about what our competition may be doing wrong; it’s about how we can do things better for our clients.  At AIS, we work for you.  Any success that we achieve begins with the success that we bring to our clients.

In the last Ice Talk I examined the value of choosing added ice production over additional freezer storage in order to better enable packaged ice producers to say yes to summer time sales or growth opportunities.  I pointed out the fact that even the biggest freezers run out of ice when the demand is high, and that very large freezers can be cost prohibitive.  Whereas added production lends itself to better operational efficiencies, manufacturing redundancies, and the ability to ramp up your production when opportunities present themselves.  Although extra ice manufacturing equipment can prove to be an essential tool to saying yes to new opportunities, this raw product still requires packaging and palletizing before it can be sold.  How does a packaged ice producer allocate the necessary labor required to accomplish this occasional task?  The short answer is automation.  Proper ice system automation can free your company from the constraints that labor imposes on your operation.  Whereas people resources are unpredictable, problematic, and disruptive, properly automated equipment systems operate on demand, and if necessary, 24 hrs a day.

A key component to an automated system is automated product palletizing.  Automated product palletizing increases operational productivity while providing operational flexibility, but getting the most from your investment involves much more than just purchasing a palletizing machine.  Making an investment in automation involves a thorough review of an ice manufacture’s available equipment, space, operational challenges, and future goals.  This involves much more than just adding a palletizing machine to the end of the packaging line.  Proper automation should enable your company to package product on demand, without obstacles, and with minimal human interface.  What good is an equipment investment if operators are still required to watch this equipment run or make adjustments to ice transfers, conveying, or packaging equipment?  Real value comes from truly eliminating labor, and truly eliminating labor requires a thorough examination of all equipment operations leading up to the palletizing equipment.

Today’s Automatic Ice Systems are engineered and built to be run by only one operational supervisor.  No matter what the required product throughput, we build packaged ice systems that reduce the labor requirement to one skilled operator.  From single packaging line operations demanding 50 pallets of ice a day to multiple packaging line operations producing hundreds of pallets a day, we have the solution to virtually eliminating all labor requirements.  By truly eliminating the labor crutch, a manufacturer’s productivity can skyrocket.  Just imagine having the tools to double your daily packaged ice output by simply turning on additional ice manufacturing equipment and possibly scheduling a second sift with only one operational supervisor. A properly integrated and automated packaged ice system may be your tool to future success and company growth.  Is your company ready for an upgrade into the future?

It’s 100 degrees outside and your retail customers are running low on ice. You are pushing your equipment as hard as it can run, your employees are tired, and you are exhausted.  The phone rings again.  The guy on the other end wants to purchase 2 truckloads of ice, every day, for the next 10 days. Regretfully, you have to pass on this opportunity.  As you hang up the phone, you begin to do the math on how much money you could have made if you were able to say yes to this opportunity. At this moment, you promise yourself to make changes to your company so that if such an opportunity presents itself next year, you will be able to say yes!

Sound familiar?  If so, you are not alone.  When it gets hot, and stays hot, there is not enough packaged ice available. Big companies with massive freezers can sometimes say yes to wholesale opportunities, but after the stored ice is depleted, even they are left with an empty freezer.  So the option of building a bigger freezer is probably not the answer.  Not only does the big freezer run out of ice when market demand is high, the costs associated with a massive freezer is prohibitive. Land cost, building cost, electrical cost, and maintenance cost makes excessive storage of packaged ice very expensive, especially if your motivation for this investment is occasional opportunities.  So how do you say yes?  The simple answer is to invest in the right tools.

The first essential tool is more ice manufacturing equipment.  The best insurance policy to avoid running out of ice is to have more ice production than your demands require.  Extra ice manufacturing equipment is always a good investment for the packaged ice producer.  This potential added production lends itself to better operational efficiencies, manufacturing redundancies, and the ability to ramp up your production when opportunities present themselves.  An extra 50 ton/day ice maker has the potential to provide your company with two extra truckloads of packaged ice a day, every day.  These are pallets of ice that are available when you need them with only a 24 hour notice.  This is extra product available without the cost associated with freezer storage.  I’m not discrediting the value of freezer storage.  Freezer storage is essential to balancing your weekly demand cycles, but extra ice manufacturing allows a more cost effective means to saying yes to new opportunities.

Although extra ice manufacturing equipment can prove to be an essential tool to saying yes to new opportunities, this raw product still requires packaging and palletizing if it is to be ready for sale.  How does a packaged ice producer allocate the necessary labor required to accomplish this task?  We will review the second set of tools that complete this equation in the next Ice Talk.

I have the opportunity to visit packaged ice manufacturing facilities throughout the country.  Even though the region may change or size of the facility may vary, two things usually remain the same:  The People and the Equipment Platform.  As for the people, no matter where I go the owners and managers that I meet are usually fiercely independent, hardworking entrepreneurs.  When it comes to the equipment platforms, I typically see old, worn equipment loosely connected into an operation that requires significant human interaction to ensure that products get made as needed.  Rarely do I stumble upon a truly engineered and productive packaged ice facility.  Although these typical packaged ice plants have made their owners significant success in the past, today’s competitive market demands more to ensure the future of these packaged ice producers.  Twenty, or even ten, years ago gross profitably in the industry allowed producers to operate less than productive equipment platforms with acceptable results, but today’s costs of doing business are not so forgiving.  For many owners, bottom line numbers are not nearly what they were two decades ago.  So how do owners turn around this declining bottom line?  There are many answers to this question; some require changes in the equipment platforms, updated business systems, or maybe new distribution technology, but the one common factor is new technology.

Today’s equipment technologies can offer packaged ice manufacturers one of the keys to future success.  If your company is considering updates to your ice manufacturing or processing equipment platform, don’t make the mistake of avoiding new technological advancements.  The packaged ice equipment platform that worked 20 years ago can handicap your company’s future success.  Not only are today’s equipment technologies more productive than yesterdays, but equipment integration and automation can make a significant impact on the future success of your company.  It is not just the equipment that you purchase, but more importantly, it is how the equipment is utilized.  Why invest in several hundred thousand dollars of new equipment technologies and not get the most from your investment?

Automatic Ice Systems helps packaged ice manufacturers get the most from investments in new equipment.  These systems are designed and engineered to be the most efficient and productive operating platforms available.  These fully integrated systems require less building space, produce significantly less waste, require minimal human intervention, and are more reliable to operate.  How do we accomplish such lofty goals?  We take care of the “what ifs” before any equipment is put into place.  Our experienced team of professionals seeks to better understand our clients’ obstacles and goals before any equipment recommendations are made.  We then design an equipment platform to best meet these individual challenges.  Once an equipment platform and system design is developed, we engineer purpose-built conveying systems to gently move raw product throughout processing and packaging without damaging the ice.  This ensures more sellable product in the bag, longer equipment life, and more reliable operations.  Post packaging, we develop custom product conveying and palletizing systems to reduce labor dependence to an absolute minimum.  Finally, and most importantly, we develop electronic control systems to properly integrate each individual equipment component into a fully integrated operating system with single point operator intervention.  Some of our AIS Control Systems even make remote monitoring and equipment intervention possible.  Real time operational information can even be sent to your smart phone.   Through this technology, AIS Engineers can even make adjustments, or do diagnostics, of your equipment from our offices in St. Louis.  Automatic Ice Systems are bringing tomorrow’s technology to life today.  Is it time for a change?  Make sure the right change is made.