Acepak Highlights Tray Forming and Stretch Wrapping for Summer Drinks Runs

When temperatures climb across South Africa, beverage and dairy producers enter their busiest stretch of the year. Demand rises for bottled water, soft drinks, juices and chilled dairy, while the festive season piles retail orders, promotional runs and multipacks onto already full production plans. Throughout November, Cape Town packaging machine maker Acepak is putting the spotlight on the end-of-line equipment that turns filled bottles, cartons and tubs into secure packs ready for the shelf and for transport. That covers tray forming machines, sleeve tunnels, label applicators and stretch wrappers.

Acepak points out that the filler is seldom where a busy season falls apart. The trouble usually starts at the end of the line, where products must be collated, packed, labelled and wrapped at the same pace they come off production. With the right secondary and transit packaging equipment in place, the entire line keeps flowing.

Forming trays around collated products

In beverage and dairy, trays are a popular way to keep bottles, cans or cartons together for handling and retail display. On Acepak’s Automatic Tray Forming Machine, a die press driven by pneumatic systems folds pre-scored cards around the collated products, and hot glue holds the folds in place. A related tray forming machine wraps pre-scored cardboard around collated products to create sturdy trays, which suits operations that need accurate, repeatable tray formation with every product held securely.

Higher-volume producers can turn to the Inline High-Speed Case Erecting and Packing Solution. It slots into the production line, feeds pre-scored cards into the machine and keeps them in sync with the products arriving. Acepak also offers pneumatic and servo operated case and carton erectors and sealers, with or without automatic product loading, plus an automated product insertion system that uses pneumatic or magnetic grippers to place products into preformed cartons.

Shelf-ready sleeves and labels

Shrink sleeves and transit labels play a big part in summer promotions and festive multipacks. The Acepak Sleeve Tunnel is a stand-alone heat tunnel that shrinks pre-applied sleeves or shrink film snugly around individual or bundled products. It is built for retail multipacks, tray-packed food items and individually labelled bottles and jars, and it distributes heat in a consistent, controlled way to give a neat and secure finish.

On the secondary and transit side, the Mechanical Case and Outer-Pack Label Applicator combines a roll-fed label system with a sensor-activated motor to label cases, outers, shrink bundles and collated packs. Getting outer-pack labels right helps distribution centres and retailers cope with the surge in volume in the weeks leading up to December.

Keeping pallets stable in transit

Forming the packs is only half the job, since they still need to arrive intact. Acepak offers several stretch wrapping machines to keep pallets stable. The ATLANTA REVOLUTION series wraps all kinds of products efficiently, including very light, unstable or easily crushed loads. The SFERA mobile wrapping machine begins as a low cost model with a pre-stretch film system and can expand as a business’s needs grow. SYNTHESI is an economical, simple to operate stretch wrapper that accepts three different film carriages, putting power pre-stretch within reach at an affordable price.

Further down the line, Acepak’s palletising solutions and robotic depalletising heads, using magnetic or pneumatic gripping technology, help move full pallets into and out of production.

One partner for the whole end of line

Acepak is a packaging machine manufacturer that designs, engineers, assembles and tests its machines at its Cape Town head office. Its range spans automated case packers, automatic packing machines, shrink wrap machines, banding machines, pouch fillers, palletising and full line integration. The business is family owned and has more than 40 years of experience behind it.

Because so much is done in-house, producers can work with Acepak as one packaging machine supplier for a complete end-of-line system instead of piecing together machines from multiple vendors. The team works with each client to understand their goals and builds solutions around their products, volumes and available floor space.

Beverage and dairy, and other sectors too

Alongside dedicated solutions for the beverage and dairy industries, Acepak serves food, pharmaceuticals, cosmetics and other sectors. Bottles, jars, cartons and tubs all have different handling requirements, and the company’s collating, forming, sleeving, labelling and wrapping equipment can be combined to match each one.

Acepak services clients in more than 36 countries, from South Africa to the United Kingdom, with offices in Cape Town, Midrand in Johannesburg, Pinetown in Durban and Skelmersdale in England. Its service and support teams help with programming, maintenance and servicing for the full life of the equipment.

Bundling for festive promotions

Many festive promotions involve bundling, such as joining two packs together or attaching a free item to a main product. Acepak’s banding machines and automatic shrink wrap machines handle exactly this kind of work, grouping products securely with no need for additional cartons. Paired with the company’s case packers and tray formers, they let a producer move between standard packs and promotional bundles on one line as orders shift during the season.

Getting ready before the festive rush

Acepak suggests that producers already under pressure from summer orders take a close look at where their end of line slows down. A manual tray or wrapping step that is fine in quieter months can turn into a bottleneck once volumes rise. Talking to an experienced packing machine manufacturer early leaves time to weigh up the options, whether that is upgrading a single machine or installing a fully integrated line, before the next peak hits.

Acepak’s solutions can be browsed by industry and by machine type, and producers can download the catalogue and reach the sales team at https://acepak.com/.

About Acepak

Family-owned Acepak manufactures end-of-line packaging machines and turnkey packing systems and has more than 40 years of experience. All equipment is designed, engineered, assembled and tested at its head office in Montague Gardens, Cape Town, and the company also has offices in Midrand, Pinetown and Skelmersdale in the United Kingdom. Its range covers case packers, shrink wrappers, banding machines, pouch fillers, tray formers, stretch wrappers and palletising systems for the beverage, food, dairy, pharmaceutical and cosmetics industries, with clients in over 36 countries.

Media Contact
Acepak
Email: info@acepak.com
Phone: +27 21 552 5999
Website: https://acepak.com/

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