Smith Dairy, operated by Fred Meyer, America’s fifth largest grocery chain, no longer cries over spilled milk. Founded in 1948, the company uses five dairies to meet the high consumer demand for milk.
At the dairy’s Phoenix facility, where production expanded to 216,000 gallons of milk a day, there is no room for error. This includes the dairy’s packaging operation. But as production increased, stretchwrappers used to secure plastic milk bottles to pallets could not keep up. “Turntables twisted the pallet load, causing milk waste,” says George Clark, dairy manager. “We needed a stabilizing solution.”