Have you ever ordered a meal that wasn’t quite right, like no red sauce for your pasta, or missing pickles on your hamburger? You were likely disappointed, regardless of the scale of the mishap.
Imagine a customer opening a bakery item from your label, to find that it was prepared incorrectly. Maybe it was missing the fruit topping or sesame seeds. Even worse, what if your label needed to recall items because of contamination concerns? In either case, this may cause customer distrust and may dissuade them from buying your products again. This is why quality control is so critical in food manufacturing. Products need to remain consistent, but QC is a matter of food safety as well.
In this article, we’ll offer some equipment that labels can rely on to improve quality control. But first, let’s explore the importance of quality control a bit more. Quality control is everything— from protecting your brand’s image to maintaining consumer safety.
The Importance of Quality Control
Often, “quality control” is regarded as throwing away products that don’t meet aesthetic requirements. While that’s part of it, it’s so much more. The importance of quality control also lies in consumer safety and protecting brand image. All are vital for running a successful and safe frozen meal brand.
Consumer Safety
While customers typically may not think of food safety unless there’s a major recall, they trust food manufacturers to create meals safe for consumption. This includes using within-date ingredients and ensuring your products are free from object and pathogen contamination. We can’t stress the importance of quality control enough— compromised food items can result in customer illness. That’s why it’s vital to rely on equipment that’s easy to clean and maintain, preventing ingredient expiry and product contamination.
Preventing Aesthetic Defects
Although not as pressing as consumer safety, preventing aesthetic defects in your products is still a key component in quality control. Aesthetics matter to customers and are more likely to repurchase products that look nice. Your label needs to ensure that your customers can count on consistency in your products, both in how they look and taste. Automated food equipment can provide your assembly process with this quality and consistency so that your products remain customers’ choice.
Protecting Brand Image
The importance of quality control is also found in protecting brand image. Protecting brand image is easy when your label is dedicated to consumer safety and the consistency and quality of your products. Once a brand experiences a recall, it’s difficult to rebuild customer trust, so it’s important to continually dedicate effort and resources to maintaining your brand’s QC practices. A positive brand image can build brand loyalty and even inspire customers to spread the word about your products, allowing new customers to find your brand. Protecting your brand image is well worth the effort and shows that your company is committed to creating a safe and memorable meal for your customers.
Consumer safety, preventing aesthetic defects, and protecting your brand image are all critical components of quality control. And with recent developments in automated food technology, quality control practices are easier than ever. Let’s look at automated equipment for bakery QC next.
Automated Equipment for Bakery QC
Automation has streamlined a lot in food manufacturing, including QC. In addition to increasing productivity, automated equipment for bakery item assembly also improves the consistency and quality of the products. It standardizes the production process according to brand specifications, significantly decreasing the manufacturing differences between products. At Quantum, we strive to design automated equipment for bakery meal assembly to simplify quality control, promoting consistency and consumer safety.
Quantum Bakery Equipment
At Quantum, we design our bakery equipment with the needs of effective QC in mind. We offer the following equipment and more at Quantum:
- Cardboard Circle Placers— Applies cardboard circles, rectangles, and squares to assembly lines to protect the product during assembly, transportation, and shelf-life.
- Sauce Applicators— Perfect for syrups, icings, and glazes
- Industrial Slicing Machines— Ideal for savory bakery items, can slice and apply stick meats and be configured to cut meats and cheeses deli-style
- Cheese/Topping Applicators— Applies shredded cheeses, as well as IQF and dried fruits and vegetables
- Dry/Granular Ingredient Toppings— Applies dry ingredients and granules, like bread crumbs, granulated cheeses, seeds, and spices
Every meal production process is different, and our equipment is flexible to meet the different manufacturing requirements of different labels. However, one thing’s for certain— the quality control capabilities of our equipment are unmatched.
Industrial Slicing Machine, Granular Applicators, and More: Quality Control and Quantum Equipment
Our equipment such as our industrial slicing machines, sauce applicators, and granular applicators all make QC easy to achieve. The importance of quality control is evident to us; we design our technology to avoid pathogen contamination, limit employee handling of the food, and promote product consistency.
Avoiding Pathogen Contamination
We make our equipment easy to clean and maintain, which prevents pathogen contamination. Most of our machines are washdown-compatible, simplifying the cleaning process. Because our equipment increases productivity, this prevents ingredients from sitting in the applicators. These features keep pathogens from growing and contaminating the food products, which would otherwise compromise their quality and cause customer illness.
Limiting Employee Handling of Food
Another way that our equipment promotes consumer safety is that it minimizes employee contact. While employees are required to be trained in food manufacturing hygiene, handling the food has a risk of passing foodborne illnesses to the products. Because our industrial slicing machines, granular applicators, and other equipment are automated, employees only have to restock the machines when they need more ingredients. Automation also prevents the need for employees to handle sharp blades and other dangerous parts, such as those in industrial slicing machines, which decreases employee accidents. This further increases food safety for both the employee and the consumer.
Promoting Product Consistency
All of our machines, from our industrial slicing machines to our granular applicators, promote product consistency, leaving far less product to be tossed due to defects. Once your brand specifies how each applicator dispenses the ingredients, you can trust that each machine makes your product according to brand requirements.
Improve Quality Control With Quantum
At Quantum, we prioritize quality and precision. We design industry-leading automated equipment that improves quality control without decreasing productivity. Quality control is an essential part of food manufacturing, and our technology allows more products to pass QC and be consumer-ready. Product image is everything, and our automated food equipment makes products more consistent and precise, exceeding customer expectations. Contact our team today to learn which of our machines can improve your quality control and assembly processes today.