West Bromwich Allied Bakeries investment pays off
“We have spent a lot of time with suppliers looking at different ways of doing things, so quality remains consistent throughout our runs,” Jackson told journalists at a press briefing on May 2.
He said newly installed equipment such as spiral coolers had “significantly reduced downtime” because it was much more accessible, meaning cleaning and maintenance took less time and entailed less disruption. The factory houses segregated cleaning areas for machinery components.
More constant product quality had been achieved by means such as replacing reciprocal slicers with band slicers, enabling loaves to be sliced more evenly.
Boosting capacity substantially
The latest investment had focused on installing a new bread plant to make the company’s Kingsmill bread brand and it could now produce 8,500 loaves every hour, boosting capacity substantially said Jackson.
Processing equipment is linked together via an electronic supervisory control and data acquisition system, which can also manage ingredient quantities for various product recipes.
Older scales for batch weighing have been replaced by newer, more accurate ones that conveyed flour direct to production line mixers with minimal mess and waste. Enhanced dough dividers have been installed to create more uniform dough portions for baking.
Other benefits achieved through a range of improvements included reduced greenhouse gas emissions through more sustainable use of heat and greener logistics initiatives.
‘Reduced carbon footprint by 10%’
Jackson explained the factory now recycled air already warmed by flue gases back into ovens used to bake bread, which meant they needed less energy to reach baking temperature. “We have reduced our overall carbon footprint by 10% and this technology is part of that.” Overall improvements had reduced waste by 2%, he added.
An overhaul of external logistics across the business had led to Allied Bakeries introducing more aerodynamic and fuel efficient trucks and relying on greater use of rail freight for raw materials, he said.
The site investment has not led to a significant increase in staff numbers, but has entailed boosting the skills of existing personnel to equip them to handle the updated systems. “We talked about future-proofing,” said Jackson. “I think that’s what we have done with this plant.”
Raft of enhancements
The raft of enhancements at the facility, which stands opposite West Bromwich Albion Football Club’s stadium, The Hawthorns, followed the commissioning of a new roll plant there in 2011. It is now Allied Bakeries’ main UK roll-producing factory.
The site is one of the final projects in a £210M UK-wide capital expenditure programme for the bakery manufacturer.
Allied Bakeries won the Bakery Manufacturing Company of the Year at Food Manufacture’s 2013 Food Manufacturing Excellence Awards. For your chance to enter the 2014 awards, click here.
