Driving Packaging Innovation Through Precision Engineering: R.A. Jones and the Future of Manufacturing Performance

Yannick Schilly: Jeff, it’s a pleasure to have this interview with you today and thanks for accepting our invitation. So, if you could, for our readers, introduce yourself, and tell us a little bit more about who is Jeff Wintring and about your career and your role at R.A Jones.

Jeff Wintring: First of all, thank you for asking me to be part of this interview. By training, I am a Mechanical Engineer.  I started my career working for a Fortune 100 company in factory automation. I did that for about four years. I then went to the machine tool industry for about eight years developing high-speed laser cutting systems with linear motors. From there, in 1998 I went to R.A Jones in their product development group. I did product development for a while, then progressed to Chief Engineer,  Director of Engineering, and then Chief Technical Officer.

I am now the Chief Solution and Integration Officer for the company, where I focus on helping customers solve their packaging challenges, either in machinery solutions or full line integration design. So, I get to work very closely with the sales team and with our customers and help them be successful and it’s very exciting.

Yannick: Well, congratulations on a very successful career. And I have seen some of your designs and some of your technical solutions, and they are just amazing. So, congratulations for that.

Yannick: Jeff, for our readers which are maybe not so familiar with R.A Jones or the Coesia group of companies, tell us who is R.A Jones, who is Coesia, and what kind of problems you solve in the marketplace.

Jeff: R.A Jones was started 120 years ago by Ruel Anderson Jones, a former dentist from Kentucky who started a packaging company in 1905 after inventing “advertising Soap” which involved wrapping printed slips of paper onto bars of soap.   The company was family owned until 1999.  We were with different companies up until 2012 when we became part of the Coesia Group. 

The Coesia Group is a privately held company headquartered in Bologna, Italy. The group consists of 22 companies throughout the world. They are very much an engineering focused machinery design company.  R.A Jones and Coesia have great synergies and are a great fit. Both understand machine design very well. At the same time, with all the additional sister companies that we now have, we get exposed to a lot more technology in different industries, and we can pull that technology into packaging machinery. So, it’s helping us evolve our packaging machinery also at the same time.

Yannick: Now on to the packaging industry. For our readers, please share—what are the challenges those customers and industries you serve are facing in terms of packaging, and what kind of automation solutions are you providing to respond to those needs?

Jeff: One of the big challenges our customers are currently facing is sustainability. They are looking to reduce packaging material in their packaged products. They are also looking to reduce the use of plastics.  So, whether or not that’s in secondary packaging or in a primary package solution, such as our pouch solutions, they are looking to reduce the amount of material and reduce the amount of plastic. So, we are having to develop machinery that can do exactly that.

The other thing they are looking for is flexibility in the machinery. The frequency of new packages needing to be run on the equipment is accelerating.  A package that would traditionally run for a long period of time now is needing to change over every six, maybe twelve months.  So, the machinery needs to be able to adapt and be modernized for that new reality. So that is a priority for our customers.

Yannick:  For perspective for our readers, the kind of high-speed automation you are designing responds to needs of companies who have to put a product into packaging in a matter of seconds, right? Not in a matter of minutes.

Jeff: Yes, for instance we design high-speed pouching equipment which we can run at speeds up to 2000 pouches a minute.  This is equipment that forms the pouch, fills the pouch, seals it, and can collate it.   We have new tools we’ve developed for the pouching equipment where we can now digitally set the number of counts that go into a package. In the past that was a hardware type of change. So, customers can do five counts, six counts, all different counts and we can do that at very high speed, very high efficiencies, which is what we are known for.

At the same time, we can also run packages at 60 a minute, 100 a minute, 400 a minute. We can do that with new sustainable package designs.

Yannick: Over the years you have been in the packaging industry and high-speed automation. What are the big trends in automation you can see?

Jeff: One of the big trends is the use of linear motors.  We have an extensive, 25 year experience with linear motors, and at the last Chicago PackExpo we introduced our Celestion^® topload platform, which is based on a modular design that allows us to configure solutions to the different packaging needs of the customer.  So, for instance, if the customer needs high speed, we can add more forming heads. If they need a longer loading area, we can increase the loading area. At the core of this platform is a linear motor system. This automation system allows us to optimize each of those functions. If we need longer dwell at one of the functions, we can do that, or if we need to move the product slower so as not to disturb it, we can do that at another station. We have the ability to optimize each packaging step. At the same time, it allows us to optimize footprint and give a very high efficiency capability for the machinery.

Yannick: Customers are more and more looking for flexibility, faster changeover, and more intuitive machines, right?

Jeff: Yes, and we equip our machines with our Optimate HMI, which allows for a more intuitive interface for our operators, as well as, connectivity and smart features. Everyone knows how to use an iPhone or Android, so we are trying to put some of that into the HMI. As the operator is looking at the HMI, there are standardized areas. If you are working on a R.A Jones machine or other Coesia company machines , the look and feel is the same, but functions are described differently. It shows pictures of the machine, shows important areas, gives options like changing timing, or getting fault information or training tools. Changeover wise, we offer our customers different options.  The most basic being manual, but we also have our Acc-U-Change^® and Acc-U-Change Plus^® options.  These are mid-level and a fully automatic, verified, changeover options.   Each setpoint and change part is verified by the control and is displayed to the operator as needing to be changed.  Ultimately, the goal is a vertical startup. When they push the “go” button, the machine is ready to start up.

Yannick: So, every machine is kind of unique, but built on core functionalities?

Jeff: Absolutely. We have core products or functions that we build our customer solutions around.  For instance, we have a family of cartoners. They run from intermittent motion up to higher speed machines. But what is different with each customer is the product they want to run. We can run cereal, foil, shrink wrap pizzas, or pouches with a base cartoner. The key is handling differences in products and how to collate and feed them into the machine infeed. It’s really how we make our customers successful, optimizing the best way of running their product in the machinery.

Yannick: How do you see Industry 4.0 and industrial AI evolving?

Jeff: We have been trying to make the machine smarter. For example, how an operator loads the carton magazine affects how well the machine runs. So, we give visual cues—green, yellow, red—to tell them if they are pushing too hard or not enough.  In the near future, I see the machinery being able to self-correct certain faults and then resume production automatically.  Leading to increase throughput.  If the fault continues, we can alert maintenance of the issue.  We also collect performance data and send it to the cloud so customers can view efficiency and performance anywhere. 

Yannick: Customers are also asking for integrated turnkey lines, correct?

Jeff: Yes, this is becoming very important. Typically, customers come to us, with a URS, describing what they want to produce. We offer concept development and can design the line—from product input to palletizing. We integrate Coesia equipment and third-party equipment when needed. We guarantee performance and efficiency of the line and make sure everything operates smoothly. It is one point of contact for the customer through system acceptance. This service is becoming more and more important as customers’ workforces change.

Yannick: And you support customers globally?

Jeff: Yes. We have an extensive service network in North America with additionally trained technicians in Europe.  We can also draw from the Coesia network for additional support in other regions.  If something happens in a region, we can ask a sister company to support. Of course, this can work both ways too.

Yannick: What would convince a customer to choose R.A Jones or Coesia?

Jeff: Regarding the machinery, it’s our Innovation capability. We solve tough packaging problems.  We build quality equipment that runs efficiently and stand behind our equipment. If something goes wrong, we make it right.  We also offer many services, such as, maintenance agreements, modernizations, training, and parts.  We have a packaging innovation group in Bologna. Customers bring ideas like new packaging formats or easy-to-open features. We can optimize, design, prototype, and test those cartons, and feed results back to customers quickly. It shortens development time significantly. Those packages are also optimized for our equipment, so they run efficiently.

Yannick: Jeff, I really appreciate this conversation, and we could go on for a long time. But I would like to conclude on a more personal note. Solving those complex packaging and automation solutions is very demanding. What keeps you energized and motivated to solve those problems, and how do you resource yourself? How do you keep your work-life balance? What are your secret tricks to keeping your energy level high?

Jeff: So, from the motivation standpoint, that’s an easy thing. I mean, the thing that drew me to R.A Jones was the variation that is constantly coming into the building.

So, one moment you’re working on food, the next moment you’re working on beverage, the next moment you’re working on pharmaceutical. There’s all the different variation and all the different methods and ways of solving the customer’s challenge that they’re bringing to you. There’s something new every single week, it makes the week seem very short, and it’s very exciting.  This, coupled with making sure our customers are successful, is a great motivator.

But after a tough day of work, you know, I’ll go home and I’ll ride my Peloton bike, or I might just sit outside and relax.  I like sitting outside and just relaxing and taking in the evening. I enjoy working outside in the garden, doing work in the yard, as well as hiking. Visiting family is important as well.

Yannick: Excellent. Well, thank you so much, Jeff, for being our interview partner here for that technology discovery. And I had the chance many times to see your technology in action. I’m always like a kid in the candy store to see that automation in action. And I can see why you are so passionate about solving those problems, designing a machine which then ultimately does what you wanted at a very high speed, and seeing that in action is a real thing.