Hi, I'm Nicole Belanda
from Rockwell Automation.
I'm the customer advocacy
program manager and we're here
to talk about results achieved.
I'm joined by Ray from Interstates
to talk about some results that
they were able to achieve with
one of their key customers.
Hi, ray. Hey, how's it going?
Good. Can you tell us what your
role is at interstates and then
also what interstates does?
OK, so I'm an automation
manager with interstates.
We're a design, built, built firm,
we got about 1200 employees.
We do anything from consulting,
automation, construction,
instrumentation, great.
So who is the customer we'll
be talking about today,
a Country Maid out of West Bend, Iowa,
they do butter braids and cake rolls.
Um, provide them to a lot of
fundraising applications. OK.
Pretty sure I've seen some of
those come home with my children.
So I'm sure that I'm a customer
of country maid.
But tell us what were they looking to solve?
And I know you've worked with them for years,
right? Yep. Yep.
It's been about a 10 year relationship.
They initially came to us trying to
increase their throughput through
their facility, higher demand.
They didn't want to expand their facilities.
So we're trying to come up with
some new ways to, you know,
increase the production and
reduce some labor.
Got it.
So it it wasn't necessarily
a Greenfield project,
they already had some equipment in place and
they were running a line it sounds like,
but they wanted more throughput
to meet demand.
What else were they looking for?
More efficiency maybe,
yeah, some more efficiency.
So yeah,
you are correct,
they had some of the equipment
the facility was running but
there was no automation was all
standalone islands of mixers and
additions and stuff like that.
So OK,
So what did Interstate suggest
and how did you, you know,
propose that to the customer?
We initially kind of sat down with them,
kind of talked through their process well,
walked the facility,
sat down with some of their engineering team,
kind of had a little discussion
on how we thought we could
increase their production and what
kind of you know software packages,
hardware packages, what would,
what would work best for them.
So it kind of stemmed from
just conversations,
more of a consulting initial engagement.
So Interstates as part of
our partner network, right.
Yeah, that is correct.
We are a gold member.
What does that mean to be a gold
member of the partner network just
for those watching. Uh, really?
Just um.
We have to have an investment
in our training.
We work hand in hand with Rockwell.
We partner with them on some
engagements with customers.
And just you know,
working as a partnership and we
really appreciate your partnership
because you're able to take your
design and consulting expertise
out into the field and help
customers solve problems.
So tell us a little bit more about what
was implemented at this customer site.
So we went with a PlantPAx solution.
They're utilizing the factory talk batch,
USC all, Rockwell power control and
Rockwell controllers historians.
So they got the full.
I got the full kit and kaboodle, yeah.
So we went from no automation
essentially to an automated line.
What else changed though,
because you were able to expand their
production by adding automation, right?
Yeah. Yep.
So initially they talked about getting a,
building some larger mixers
and that created a problem.
They'd have to increase their,
the building size.
So we're able to keep the same mixers.
We were able to add another line.
I think we reduced the mixing time by about.
23% which which allowed that those
mixers to feed an additional line.
We also increase the line speed by
14% and reduce a bunch of labor.
So they were able to almost
over double their output,
you know by adding the second line
without adding any additional labor.
That's fabulous.
Those are some really great results.
So what else has been happening
with the customer since that
initial project was done?
That like with some of the reporting
features and them actually be able
to see you know anywhere from what
is the temperature affect their
product because with on the pastry
line with dough and flour and stuff
like that the outside temperature
inside temperature really affects
you know the consistency of that.
So they actually added on to the
facility several times since then
automated more of the ingredient
feeds we're able to put some
of the flour inside because of.
We wanted a certain attempt to
give it a better texture, um.
And we've also done some
ERP integration with them.
So their distributors would put in
orders and then their ERP system would
have essentially create campaigns,
put them on the batch list, their operator
would come in in the morning.
Everything they needed to do
was already set up.
They would just essentially hit start.
And then we did productions and
consumptions on raw materials in
their ERP would automatically order.
Order some of the raw materials
when they got low.
This sounds like a really
fun customer to work with.
Like they're open to digital transformation,
they're open to trying new things.
Yeah, they're very forward thinking.
I mean, they've worked with us on some
some testing and some
beta releases and software,
we actually two months ago just finished
up the PlantPAx 5.0 upgrade with them.
So that's great.
Well,
Congrats Country Maid on your
digital transformation so far and
your continued journey and thank
you so much Ray for telling us what
Interstates is doing and we're
really appreciative that we got to
hear your results achieved. Yeah.
Thank you for your time today.
I appreciate it.