Winery Chooses Columbia Robotic Palletizer System

Proven Palletizing Technologies Reduce Labor Cost and Increase Uptime
Edited from Packaging World's June 2008 article "New BIB wine line toasts tried-and-true technologies"

As the volume of wine production increased at Mission Bell Wineries, so did the cost of manual labor. Mission Bell Wineries, located in Madera, CA and a subsidiary of the world’s larges wine business Constellation Wines, produces popular brand name wines such as Paul Masson, Black Box, Hardys and Robert Mondavi. “We realized that in order to be competitive within the premium wine business, we had to bottle more wine in less time” said Dennis Hartman, Director of Bottling. This is when it was decided to design the new 3 liter bag-in-box packaging line with an ergonomic layout that would limit the amount of human involvement and drastically decrease the number of operators involved.

One of the key improvements in this project was replacing an existing competitors palletizer with a Columbia Machine HL4000 High Level Palletizer. “We chose a reliable, top-fed machine, Columbia is extremely price competitive, and the value for the dollar has proven to be very significant in that, once again, we have a machine center that is virtually maintenance free and is very operator friendly.”

By selecting Columbia Machine’s HL4000 palletizer, Mission Bell Winery was able to increase productivity from 2,400 cases per day to 4,400 cases per day, producing over 14 million cases a year. The HL4000 is able to effortlessly handle the 46 pound cases with the use of close center rolls and ½” thick stripper plate to support the heavy layers. In addition, Columbia’s latest technology “Smart Squeeze” helps maintain package integrity.

Columbia’s HL4000 included the new Product Manager Controls Package which consists of an Allen Bradley Compact Logix PLC, PanelView Plus 600 Color Touch Screen HMI and Columbia’s Product Manager Software. Product Manager provides incredible flexibility to the staff at Mission Bell allowing users to easily add or adjust product patterns, modify machine functions and view built-in production reports. Dennis Hartman states, “The ease of operation has allowed for fast and effective training on the HL4000.”

“The addition of the Columbia Machine HL4000 High Level Palletizer is proving to be maintenance free, operator free and is continuously producing quality loads. In addition, the equipment availability measurement is in excess of 99% since initial start up” states Dennis Hartman.

The success of the new Columbia Machine palletizer at Mission Bell in Madera, California, has encouraged other Constellation Brand companies to integrate a Columbia palletizer into their facility’s packaging lines. Vincor, another Constellation brand, currently has an FL150 on order for their Niagara Falls, Ontario plant and a HL6000 is pending for their British Columbia plant.


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Proven Palletizing Technologies Reduce Labor Cost and Increase Uptime Edited from Packaging World's June 2008 article "New BIB wine line toasts tried-and-true technologies"

Proven Palletizing Technologies Reduce Labor Cost and Increase Uptime
Edited from Packaging World's June 2008 article "New BIB wine line toasts tried-and-true technologies"