Emerald Packaging, a privately held flexible packaging company based in Union City, CA, USA, has invested in the EFI Packaging Productivity Suite, including business intelligence and inventory-tracking components to optimize day-to-day operations and provide greater accuracy in pricing.

With EFI Radius ERP software at its core, the Packaging Suite offers an advanced end-to-end integrated and automated workflow management solution, utilizing smart software to optimize the business from the client’s desk throughout planning, production and delivery. It accomplishes this with certified workflows designed to fit the process and product mix of the packaging or label enterprise.

The certified workflows eliminate touches, streamline production, reduce waste and improve capacity utilization to provide Emerald Packaging with sustainable process and profit improvement.
 
“Our company has gotten larger, and our jobs more complex. We wanted seamless integration and business intelligence without having to write a program ourselves,” says Emerald Packaging CEO Kevin Kelly. “The business intelligence module is a big advantage providing real time information about our performance. Our controller loves the accounting package because of its ease of use. We’re excited about the accuracy of the pricing module, as well.”

Emerald Packaging is replacing systems from a software vendor that has gone out of business. With no vendor support available, Emerald had to devote considerable resources to make programming adjustments in its software using the program’s source code. Switching to the new EFI Suite, and having the backing of EFI for support and continued feature updates, will give Emerald Packaging more time to focus on growing its core business.

Emerald’s prior ERP system also presented challenges in terms of its expense tracking and business intelligence capabilities. The EFI Packaging Suite eliminates these issues, and already the system is giving Emerald Packaging the information it needs to pin down costs and distribute them correctly.

The 53-year-old company produces flexible packaging for the food processing industry, including salad packaging and vegetable bags. Its assets include lamination equipment, multiple printing presses and bag lines, a pouching line, slitters, interlocking machines for zipper insertion and special machinery that is capable of laser scoring and perforation on thin plastic materials.

“The flexibility of the new software installation is important because it has to handle all of these different processes within our operations,” adds Kelly. “Having a closed-loop system is also crucial. In servicing the food industry, we must be able to track jobs back to the pallet of film used in the case of a recall. EFI’s Packaging Suite allows us to do just that, and so much more. We’re very excited to move forward.”

Part of Emerald Packaging’s relationship with EFI will include training at the 2016 EFI Connect users’ group conference. “We have Connect in our calendar and look forward to being a part of the larger user community of EFI packaging ERP users,” says Kelly. “It will be helpful to learn from other users and to understand how they’ve overcome operational challenges by leveraging EFI software systems.”

“Emerald Packaging has taken an important step to gain a higher level of insight into its food packaging manufacturing costs,” explains David Taylor, general manager, enterprise segment, EFI Productivity Software. “The operational intelligence and capability to quote jobs with precision will streamline its complex manufacturing workflow, reducing stress amongst user teams while helping the company provide better service and improve its bottom line.”