PETpla.net Insider 05 / 2020

PACKAGING / PALLETISING PETplanet Insider Vol. 21 No. 05/20 www.petpla.net 22 Interview with Minoru Toyota President of Tsumagoi Meisui Co. Ltd. What is the key to success for your company? Without a doubt one of the main factors in our recent success was the opportunity offered by new sales channels, or more precisely, we changed from a traditional type of “business”, that of selling our products through distribution points, shops and supermarkets, to one of “e-commerce”, managed directly by head office. What are the current market trends for your reference sector? In the world of mineral water, the main criterion of consumer choice is the price of the product. In fact, everyone whether final consumers or bottlers (in the case of working with third party), ask us for cheap products. For this reason Tsumagoi Meisui Co. Ltd, the same as every other company which bottles water, needs to compete on the market by keeping the production costs and sales prices low, and with this aim, developing innovative solutions that are able to offer products that are increasingly competitive. What are the main factors that led Tsumagoi to invest in a new stretch-blow moulder supplied by SMI? The main factor that led us to choose an SMI system, rather than another brand, was the compactness of the machine from the EBS K range. The new range of SMI blowers stands out from others, with its unique, compact module that integrates the preform heating section (oven) with the stretch-blow moulding (carousel), this technical configuration fits perfectly within the available space inside our production factory. In your view, what are the main challenges for future expansion? The biggest challenge that we need to face for future growth, is certainly the development of solutions that guarantee the best combination between “bottle capacity and volume” and “the number of bottles in a cardboard box”, with the aim of optimising storage and distribution operations and reducing their costs. What were the biggest challenges that in the “business” of mineral water Tsumagoi has overcome? Working with head office, we faced and overcame a demanding programme to reduce the physical costs of distribution, the success of which depended on the creation of new bottles in PET with particular characteristics, which reduced the cost of packaging materials, such as bottles without labels. the stretch rod cycle and accurate control of their position, as well as providing energy savings.  ultra-compact system: the preform heating section (oven) is integrated within the stretch-blow mould- ing section (carousel) in a single compact module, which makes this system suitable even for bottling lines in limited space.  reduced blower energy consump- tion, thanks to the preform heat- ing module, equipped with high efficiency IR lamps and the stretch blow-moulding module with an air dual recovery system that allows the reduction of energy costs tied to the production of high pressure compressed air.  the structure that surrounds the oven and the carousel is equipped with slightly rounded protection doors, which provide more space inside the machine so that cleaning and maintenance can be carried out easily and safely.  the stretch-blow moulding system uses high performance low dead- volume valves that reduce pre- blowing and blowing times, there- fore improving efficiency and the quality of the bottles produced.  the machinery is managed by the MotorNet System for automa- tion and control, which ensures constant maintenance of optimum processing parameters throughout the entire production cycle and the direct modification of the machine settings, thereby simplifying format changeover operations. When the container becomes competition Over the last few years, the com- petition between companies in the mineral water sector has increas- ingly evolved around the price of the product that needs to be low but high quality for consumers. To be able to maintain or increase their share of the market, bottling companies need to develop innovative solutions that are able to reduce production, running and distribution costs. All this requires careful analysis of the characteristics and performance of the bottles in PET that are used, analysis that persuaded the Japanese company Tsumagoi Meisui to create new containers that optimise the combination between the volume of the bottle blown by the SMI rotary stretch-blow moulder and the number of bottles contained in the cardboard box. Among the best formats, to reduce storage and distri- bution costs, Tsumagoi Meisui chose 0.32 l and 0.5 l square based bottles in PET and 0.41 l and 0.5 l cylindrical bottles. www.smigroup.it The staff from Tsumagoi during the factory acceptance test The Tsumagoi Meisui Co. Ltd production plant