MULTIVAC spray system replaces interleaver for thinly sliced products

Slicing and packaging cheese, ham and vegan products sustainably: With its innovative spray system, MULTIVAC Sustainable Liquid Interleaving, MULTIVAC is introducing a sustainable solution for packaging thinly sliced or highly sticky products. This means that there is no requirement for the conventional interleaving film between the slices of these products – and the consumption of plastics during packaging can be reduced to the bare minimum. Thinly sliced cheese, ham or vegan products are presented very attractively in the pack, and the individual slices can be removed cleanly by the consumer. The new system can be integrated into existing slicer lines, and it is available with immediate effect for individual tests and product development in MULTIVAC's new Center of Excellence for Slicers & Automation Solutions.

Precision nozzles on the spray system atomise a liquid interleaving medium, which is both odourless and tasteless and can be tailored to the particular properties, e.g. fat content, of the sliced product. It is applied evenly to the underside of the slices. The adhesion between the individual slices is therefore reduced, but the product itself (taste, smell, colour) however is not altered. This procedure is common practice in the food industry, e.g. with bakery products or sweets.

(Photo courtesy: MULTIVAC)

Customised applications in the Center of Excellence

Food producers can now convince themselves of the benefits of the new solution: “We want to offer Sustainable Liquid Interleaving to our customers as another innovation for the sustainable processing and packaging of their products. They are therefore invited to get an impression of our innovative solution in our new Center of Excellence for Slicers & Automation Solutions,” explains Manfred Achenbach, Senior Vice President of the Slicing Business Unit. “There we will be conducting customised tests with their sliced products in order to develop a bespoke system, which is designed perfectly for the particular product characteristics and the requirements of their slicing solution.”

At the beginning of the year, MULTIVAC put its new Center of Excellence for Slicers & Automation Solutions into operation as part of the so-called Training and Application Center (TAC) at the company's headquarters in Wolfertschwenden. There it is possible to view practically all the solutions from the MULTIVAC product range, which are used in the food industry. This includes the presentation of complete lines from product infeed to end-of-line, and these are tailored precisely to the needs of customers. The visitors get a feeling for the complete process chain, which is then reproduced later in their own production environment. The process chain ranges from a demonstration of the various slicers, through to the presentation of the different loading solutions downstream of the slicer, and right up to the actual packaging process itself. Working together with the customer, MULTIVAC's experts conduct customised tests with the particular product, while also examining the eventual solution for feasibility, output, give-away and yield - as well of course as the return on investment.