A fast-growing Cambridge company has its sights on becoming the largest supplier of dry ice in the East of England after completing a six-figure investment.
Grabbit And Chill, a sister company to Cambridgeshire same-day courier firm,
Grabbit And Run, has installed a new packing line featuring a
GIC vertical form fill and seal packing machine at its Cottenham site to cope with increased demand for its dry-ice delivery service.
Established in 1993 by Pete Howard (pictured), Grabbit And Run employs a team of 50 people who look after the delivery needs of over 900 companies in and around Cambridge. Many of the companies are active in pharmaceuticals and food production, leading to the demand for high-quality, food-grade dry-ice for food packaging, biological samples, and vaccine preservation.
Dry ice can be delivered loose in chests or poly/styrofoam boxes, but it is easier and safer to handle in bags. With a temperature of -78°C, it should not be handled without protection, as it can cause frostbite and skin burns.
The new packing line, which was overseen by Nathan Bennett of
CN Engineering Services, allows Grabbit And Chill to fully automate the production and packing of its dry ice, more than doubling its throughput capacity and halving the time it takes to pack and produce the 10kg bags of dry ice.
Mr Bennett said: “Before we designed and installed this new packing line, Pete’s team were doing everything by hand. Now they have a highly efficient and reliable automated packing solution, which will allow them to pack five to eight 10kg bags of dry ice per min. Before, it was taking each person around 1min to manually pack one bag, so it is a significant improvement.”
Complete turnkey projectThe complete turnkey project installed by Mr Bennett comprises in-feed conveyors that transfer the dry ice from its cooling machine to a GIC VFB4 vertical form fill and seal packaging machine, which in turn supplies an out-feed elevator that transfers the packs to a rotary table for packing. The line eliminates the risks associated with manual packing and ensures more accurate bag weights. GIC has a long-standing relationship with Mr Bennett, but this is the first time the company has supplied one of its vertical form fill and seal machines to a dry ice manufacturer.
Keith Marrow, customer services manager at GIC, said: “We have been designing and manufacturing vertical form fill and seal machines for over 40 years, but have never before been asked to work with dry ice. We have worked with Nathan for many years, and he knows how good our machines are and how flexible we are in terms of customising our machines to meet the needs of the end user.
“The VFB4 we supplied to Nathan is ideally suited to this application. It is robust, easy to maintain, and efficient. We are very pleased to hear that the new line is allowing Grabbit And Chill to operate more effectively and that it is helping them meet current demand and also gives them capacity for growth.”
Mr Howard said that the company had two main goals when it first approached CN Engineering Services, both of which have been achieved. He said: “We used to rely on manual labour to shovel the dry ice into the bags, weigh them and then hand-seal each bag. This was a time-consuming process that involved considerable health and safety compliance.”
He concluded: “Our aims were to improve our speed and efficiency and reduce costs. We have achieved these goals thanks to the new packing line, and the GIC machine has allowed us to increase productivity and achieve a more accurate weight in the bags we are producing. We are now in an excellent position to grow and have our sights set on becoming the largest supplier of dry ice in the East of England.”