From Tradition to Transformation: Pistachio Producer’s Journey to Modernize Efficiency

A prominent family-owned pistachio farm located in California has established itself as one of the nation’s leading producers. As a top producer of pistachios in the United States, their operations span the entire production process, including harvesting, sorting, cleaning, roasting, flavoring, and packaging. Known for high-quality products, this business markets both its own branded and white-labeled packaged pistachios to a variety of retailers. Their innovation in manufacturing and dedication to minimizing waste highlight the company’s commitment to sustainability and efficiency in the food and beverage industry.

Complex environment, constant variability forces production schedules with a short runway

The pistachio producer’s campus is home to more than just the company’s headquarters. It has a number of buildings housing production, highlighting the scale and complexity of production that demands careful attention to scheduling and efficiency. While no two food production companies are alike, the business stands out for their sophisticated sorting and grading processes, which combine automatic methods like sensors and cameras with manual techniques. This ensures high-quality outputs and minimizes waste, despite the variability in raw materials—the pistachios grown on company-owned farms. Their approach exemplifies the adaptability required in food manufacturing to accommodate changing inputs and optimize processes. Adding to the intricate nature of the production environment is the variety of packaging, sizes, and maker’s labels across their system. They distribute directly to retailers using their own brand label, and produce white-label product for other brands, using those brands’ packaging.

Before implementing an advanced production scheduling system, the company relied on intricate Excel spreadsheets to plan daily operations. This method allowed schedulers to only create a short-term schedule, limiting their ability to plan beyond a day or two. With just two production schedulers and three to eight packaging lines in each of their production facilities, the scheduling process was difficult, time-consuming, and inefficient.

The challenges extended to their fill-and-pack operations, which involve packaging pistachios in various formats, palletizing, and shipping. The lack of long-term visibility hindered the company’s ability to optimize processes, reduce changeovers, and maximize output. Furthermore, the business leaders wanted to arm production schedulers with the ability to create what-if scenarios, so they could apply their expertise and analyze innovative ways to drive up output to improve business results. Recognizing the limitations of their current approach and eager to modernize scheduling practices, the company searched for a solution to help schedulers produce better schedules in less time while boosting efficiency.

Results

• Enabled schedulers to sense and adapt to changing conditions, improving on-time delivery to 96%
• Boosted scheduler efficiency and enabled better decision-making
• Improved changeover scheduling, increasing facility output by 22%
• Enhanced effectiveness by shifting from reactive to proactive scheduling

From complexity to clarity: Optimizing efficiency with scheduling modernization

The pistachio company enlisted the help of On Time Edge to implement an advanced production scheduling system and create models to support their unique needs.  While the organization plans to expand the use of the scheduling system incrementally, the effort started with the packaging building, which houses five fill-and-pack lines. The On Time Edge manufacturing process experts performed process mapping across all five packaging lines to build scheduling models tailored to the company’s unique operations.

Then, with the concentrated focus in mind, the On Time Edge planning and scheduling experts recommended using the assumption that product availability would reflect roasting and flavoring process inputs. Then they helped the operations team create a sequence to minimize changeovers, so the schedulers could use the new system to optimize fill-and-pack production, establishing a solid foundation for future improvements.

The implementation project continued with the integration of three critical systems: the company’s ERP system (the business system), their shop floor efficiency display tool, and the new scheduling application. This robust integration provides the organization with comprehensive data to feed the scheduling system, enhancing planning accuracy.

Because the schedulers were instrumental in the original evaluation process, and they advocated for the adoption of an advanced scheduling application, the organization experienced seamless implementation and total stakeholder buy-in. System adoption was quick and easy, thanks to a user-friendly application and high-touch, tailored guidance by the On Time Edge planning and scheduling consultants. As a result, the company enabled its operations team to generate better schedules in a fraction of the time, paving the way for increased output and operational efficiency.

From reactive to proactive: New capability means adapting with to variability with ease

The implementation of the advanced scheduling system combined with careful process mapping, robust sequencing and scheduling models, rich data streams, and guidance from expert planning and scheduling consultants enabled transformative results, even with the narrow one-facility focus. The pistachio company experienced remarkable efficiency gains, as schedulers transitioned from a labor-intensive, day-long process to producing detailed schedules effortlessly with just a few clicks. This newfound efficiency allowed their planners to focus on optimizing operations, leveraging the improved visibility provided by the system to achieve increased output and drive higher productivity. Furthermore, the enhanced capabilities empowered the organization to move away from reactive scheduling, enabling proactive optimization that maximized resource utilization and significantly reduced waste.

The most astonishing and impressive outcome from this company’s transformation journey so far is their newfound ability to adapt to constant shifts in raw material characteristics. The variability in harvested pistachios presents unique scheduling challenges due to seasonal and quality factors. The organization is leveraging the scheduling system to adapt to this variability, creating optimal production schedules that maximize profits and meet contractual commitments. All told, these advancements positioned this food producer with complex conditions to operate with greater precision, sustainability, and effectiveness than ever before.

This company’s partnership with On Time Edge marks a significant milestone in their transformation journey. The implementation of an advanced scheduling system has improved operational efficiency, increased output, and empowered schedulers to plan proactively. As they continue to expand the system’s use across their operations, the business is poised to achieve even greater success and scalability in production scheduling.

Looking ahead, this pistachio producer plans to expand their use of the scheduling system to upstream processes. By integrating roasting and flavoring operations based on demand and packaging capacity, they aim to optimize the flow of materials and further enhance efficiency. The ongoing relationship with their On Time Edge experts ensures the organization can evolve at a pace they are comfortable with.