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(Near Field Communication) technology into one RFID tag. The dual purpose tag allows Nicaragua's Fish Ministry to spot-check boats, buoys, and traps for licenses, while packing houses use it to receive and record daily catch and freshness (with the EPC part of the tag). Fish- ermen and lobstermen rely on the NFC part of the tag to identify GPS locations of traps and associate the locations to the quantity caught and other data. According to Infratab's Terry Myers: "The results are in progress, but the benefits are significant in terms of sustainability, traceability, and freshness. When supply is in danger, as it is with the langouste (spiny lobster) population in Nicaragua, being able to have a tagging solution that is hard to counterfeit and easy to enforce, while also offering GPS tracking and monitoring of boat and temperature specifics for compliance with EU and U.S. food safety regulations, is key to enabling Nicaraguan packing houses to export lobsters harvested by artisan fishermen and ensures their freshness, too."
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Peeling Away Inefficiency and Find- ing New Opportunities at LoBue
When LoBue Citrus, a family-run grower and distributor of oranges based in Lindsey, California, was looking to automate their manual pro- cesses and boost their tracking capabilities, they were expecting to find savings in man-hours. But, they didn't quite expect to discover as many other opportunities that the implementation of technology would reveal. A few years
ago, the company participated in a pilot project that was headed up by C.H. Robinson, FoodLogiQ, Inter-
cycle counts three or four times each week. The other opportunity came in the way of business analysis and operational management, says Clark. Specifically, "We're now able to use some of the cultural input from
our growers, such as pesticides that may have been applied, and we're able to track that back to a specific lot via the new system." Clark adds, "We can also give our growers feedback on how their
fruit is holding up, so the technology is helping with management prac- tices throughout the supply chain, too. Now there's interaction from the field all the way to the retailer."
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Silver Eagle Distributors Turns to Paylode to Fill a Void
Texas-based Silver Eagle Distributors, the nation's largest Anheuser-
Busch distributor and one of the largest Grupo Modelo distributors in the country, recently turned to Paylode Cargo Protection Systems to literally 'fill a void' in their fleet operations. In particular, Silver Eagle was experiencing damages in its route
trucks used to ship cased beverage skids in 20-bay roll-up trailers. "There was a gap between the side walls and the skids of approxi- mately 6 to 10 inches, which was causing the pallets to shift," explains Justin Stovall, business development manager, Paylode Cargo Systems. Silver Eagle took a look at different companies' solutions to "fill the
void" in the trailer, but settled on Paylode. "Paylode engineers designed and developed a customized, reusable
void spacer that is comprised of 100 percent recyclable material," says Stovall. "Silver Eagle was able to eliminate damages due to load shift. Also, the plastic void spacer 'nests' down to 1 inch, so it takes up very minimal warehouse space."
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mec, and Bayer Crop- Science to study food traceability, explains Tom Clark, operations manager at LoBue. Following the project, LoBue purchased Intermec's CN4 mobile computer, the PB50 rugged mobile label printer, and the PB40 portable printer. "Prior to the imple- mentation, just about everything we did at LoBue was manual," acknowledges Clark, including daily physical inventories, once at night and another in the morning, at two separate facilities. What used to take about 32 man-hours shared between two employees each day was reduced to 3-4 hours for one person, who performs periodic
24 MARCH 2012 • FOOD LOGISTICS
Ergologistics Gives Workers a Hand with Lift 'n Buddy
It's a bold statement to describe your product as the "Future of
Hand Trucks," but Ergologistics, the manufacturer of the Lift 'n Buddy, is living up to the claim. Lift 'n Buddy is a mobile lifting device that combines the best of a
standard two-wheeler's durabil- ity and functionality, with automatic lifting and lowering capabilities. "We're targeting the manufacturing,
warehousing, distribution, supermar- kets, and route-based delivery sectors," says James Dravitz, director of opera- tions. However, it's the catch-all "miscel- laneous" category that's also generating a lot of interest in the product. The miscellaneous category is largely made up of the hospitality industry, says Dravitz, in particular, hotels, res- taurants, and bars—workplaces that are associated with a lot of heavy lifting but that can't accommodate a larger piece of equipment.
Think of the range of employees who www.foodlogistics.com