Griffith Foods Demonstrates Robots with a Human Touch: ProFood World

How can food processors balance automation adoption with workforce retention and morale?

In its modern plant in the Antioquia area of Colombia, the global food producer integrates collaborative robotics to boost productivity, safety, and well-being—without losing sight of its human and sustainable character.

This is an AI-generated episode. Read the full featured article on ProFood World.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:03

Welcome to Through the Line, the podcast exploring innovations and information across the packaging and processing landscape. From topics impacting consumer packaged goods and healthcare packaging to the latest technologies and food processing operations.

SPEAKER_01 0:22

Hi, I'm Casey Flanagan, Associate Editor with ProFood World. This AI-generated podcast episode covers how Griffith Foods integrated collaborative robots at its plant in Colombia to boost productivity while prioritizing worker well-being. It explores the use of digital twins for seamless implementation and highlights how automation can eliminate high-risk physical tasks, allowing for strategic workforce reallocation without job losses.

SPEAKER_02 0:45

Today we are exploring how Griffith Foods revolutionized their Colombian packaging lines by integrating collaborative robots, not to replace their workforce, but to actually protect it, which kind of proves that automation and a human-centric culture can drive productivity at the same time.

SPEAKER_03 1:04

Yeah, it really is a fascinating case study. We are untacking how a global food producer with over a hundred years of history managed to automate a really complex end-of-line packaging operation.

SPEAKER_02 1:14

Right, and doing it while strictly adhering to their core value of putting people first. We are looking specifically at the Griffith Foods production plant and in Marinella, Antiochia, Colombia.

SPEAKER_03 1:24

And to really understand why this matters, you kind of have to grasp the sheer scale of the operation at Marinella.

SPEAKER_02 1:30

Yeah, because Griffith Foods is not some small boutique manufacturer, right?

SPEAKER_03 1:33

Exactly. No, they have a massive global footprint. We are talking operating in over 30 countries with more than 5,100 employees worldwide. Wow. Yeah. And the plant in Maranilla, it serves as the absolute cornerstone for their entire Andean region operations. When we talk about output, this facility produces nearly 21,000 tons of food solutions annually.

SPEAKER_02 1:56

21,000 tons. That is massive.

SPEAKER_03 1:59

Right. And the product mix is incredibly diverse too. Like 70% of that output is liquid products, and the other 30% is powder-based solutions.

SPEAKER_02 2:07

So we were talking custom sauces, breading mixes, specialized seasonings, that kind of stuff.

SPEAKER_03 2:11

Exactly. Supplying major clients that need absolute consistency, you know, KFC, Burger King, Juan Valdez.

SPEAKER_02 2:18

Right. And maintaining that scale requires incredible precision. But historically, the very final step of this whole sophisticated process relied entirely on grueling manual labor.

SPEAKER_03 2:29

Yeah. And that final step is really where our bottleneck comes into focus.

SPEAKER_02 2:32

I mean, imagine walking into the gym and your trainer hands you a heady, awkwardly weighted box. Yeah. And they tell you to lift it, twist your spine, place it carefully on a high shelf, and then just, you know, repeat that exact motion.

SPEAKER_03 2:44

Sounds terrible.

SPEAKER_02 2:45

Right. Now imagine they tell you to do that 5,775 times.

SPEAKER_03 2:49

Yeah, that is not a workout.

SPEAKER_02 2:51

No, that is a recipe for a severe injury. But until recently, that was just a regular Tuesday for line workers at this plant.

SPEAKER_03 3:00

It really was. The specific pain point was the end of line calletizing, especially for their high-volume doy-pack packaging.

SPEAKER_02 3:07

And for anyone listening who might not know, doi packs are those flexible stand-up pouches.

SPEAKER_03 3:12

Right, often used for sauces or powders.

SPEAKER_02 3:14

Exactly. They are great for consumers, but for packaging, they are a nightmare to handle manually. They are filled with shifting liquids, so the center of gravity just constantly moves.

SPEAKER_03 3:24

Yeah, and when you put dozens of those into a box, that box becomes an incredibly awkward shifting weight. And operators were physically lifting, rotating, and stacking these all day.

SPEAKER_02 3:34

So Griffith Foods actually decided to quantify exactly what that physical burden looked like.

SPEAKER_03 3:39

They did. They used specialized software called human tech to run formal ergonomic studies. And the data was, well, it was alarming.

SPEAKER_02 3:49

I can imagine.

SPEAKER_03 3:50

On line one alone, operators were making exactly 5,775 repetitive movements every 24 hours.

SPEAKER_02 3:58

Wow.

SPEAKER_03 3:58

And line two was not much better hitting 5,005 movements.

SPEAKER_02 4:01

And these are not simple gestures, these are full body movements, bending, twisting at the core, reaching up.

SPEAKER_03 4:07

Exactly. When a human body faces that specific type of repetitive stress, micro tears and severe joint wear and tear are practically guaranteed.

SPEAKER_02 4:16

It is entirely unsustainable. I mean, if you are running a facility, you simply cannot ignore a metric, like 5,000 daily lifting motions.

SPEAKER_03 4:25

Right, because it becomes a severe operational threat.

SPEAKER_02 4:28

Yeah, fatigue goes up, operational consistency drops, minor errors happen, and absentee rates rise because workers literally just need time to recover from the pain.

SPEAKER_03 4:36

It is a fundamental risk to the plant's productivity. Plus, it was a direct contradiction to their own company philosophy.

SPEAKER_02 4:42

Right, their lean manufacturing philosophy. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 4:44

Exactly. They use the Griffith Production System, or GPS. A core tenet of GPS is treating people as the primary asset of the organization.

SPEAKER_02 4:54

You cannot claim to operate a human-centric facility if your primary asset is being systematically broken down by your own production line.

SPEAKER_03 5:01

Perfectly said. So management knew intervention was not an option, it was a necessity. They needed a solution robust enough for the massive volume, but safe enough to work shoulder to shoulder with their staff.

SPEAKER_02 5:13

Which brings us to the technological intervention. In August 2024, they installed Columbia's first robotic PE 10 palletizing cell.

SPEAKER_03 5:22

Right, which is equipped with a universal robots, UR10E, collaborative robot, or, you know, a cobot.

SPEAKER_02 5:28

But installing a robot is not a magic fix. Right. The parameters here were wild. The cell had to synchronize two entirely different production lines feeding into it at the exact same time.

SPEAKER_03 5:38

Yeah, handling 32 different SKUs.

SPEAKER_02 5:40

Managing five different box types, six pallet configurations, and stacking up to 2,750 millimeters high.

SPEAKER_03 5:46

All at 10 cycles per minute.

SPEAKER_02 5:48

Okay, so wait. If you have ever dealt with a factory floor, you know how chaotic that sounds. With 32 different product variations funneling into a single robotic cell, how does that not just become a massive traffic jam?

SPEAKER_03 6:02

Well, the secret was their meticulous pre-installation engineering. They did not just bolt a machine to the floor and cross their fingers.

SPEAKER_02 6:09

I would hope not.

SPEAKER_03 6:10

Yeah, they used a digital twin.

SPEAKER_02 6:11

So basically a highly accurate virtual model of the whole system.

SPEAKER_03 6:16

Exactly. Think of it like a hyper-realistic video game simulation of the factory built with real-world physics. They could intentionally crash the virtual system to see its limits without any real-world risk.

SPEAKER_02 6:29

That must save an enormous amount of downtime. You solve the puzzle months in advance on a computer screen instead of halting live production.

SPEAKER_03 6:36

Precisely. And after the digital twin, they ran factory acceptance tests with the actual physical products.

SPEAKER_02 6:42

So they knew it worked before they even installed it. But the hardware itself had to be pretty advanced to handle the merging lines right.

SPEAKER_03 6:48

Oh, absolutely. The cell uses a specialized four-suction cup gripper. It can pull different products from a shared conveyor belt and seamlessly organize those boxes into precise patterns on separate pallets.

SPEAKER_02 7:01

So the gripper acts almost like a highly coordinated sorting mechanism.

SPEAKER_03 7:05

Exactly, not just a lifting tool. It grabs the box securely using the four vacuum zones and just routes it perfectly.

SPEAKER_02 7:11

That level of reliability is impressive.

SPEAKER_03 7:13

It really is. The plant manager there, Santiago Aspina, noted that any stoppages since installation have only been due to external factors, like upstream material delays.

SPEAKER_02 7:23

Never the robot itself.

SPEAKER_03 7:25

Right, never the robot. And the programming interface is so intuitive that if they need to adapt to new seasonal demands, they do not need to hire external software engineers to rewrite the code.

SPEAKER_02 7:35

That is huge for agility. But you know, reliability and speed are one thing. Whenever you put moving machinery next to humans, safety is the paramount concern. Because traditional industrial robots are massive hazards. You have to lock them behind heavy steel cages. But they use a collaborative robot here.

SPEAKER_03 7:51

Right, which operates without those physical barriers.

SPEAKER_02 7:55

So how do you ensure safety when a machine lifting thousands of heavy boxes is right next to the workforce?

SPEAKER_03 8:01

Well, they installed a network of highly responsive safety features, mostly sophisticated proximity sensors that create an invisible safety perimeter.

SPEAKER_02 8:09

Okay, so if a human steps into that zone, what happens?

SPEAKER_03 8:12

The sensors detect the intrusion instantly and command the robot to slow its movements way down. Plus, the robotic arm has force-limiting technology.

SPEAKER_02 8:22

Meaning, if it actually bumps into someone, it stops.

SPEAKER_03 8:25

Exactly. It detects the resistance and stops immediately. The collision is soft and totally non-injurious.

SPEAKER_02 8:32

That completely changes the relationship between the worker and the machine. It transitions from a workplace hazard into an active protective tool.

SPEAKER_03 8:39

It really does. But the physical tech was only half the battle. The true test was managing the human element and workforce expectations.

SPEAKER_02 8:46

Right, because when workers see a highly efficient robot, the immediate fear is usually, well, job cuts.

SPEAKER_03 8:52

That fear of replacement is a totally natural response. And management had to address it head on. The automation did reduce the required personnel on that line from six people down to four.

SPEAKER_02 9:04

But they successfully dispelled the fears, right? Because zero jobs were actually lost.

SPEAKER_03 9:09

Exactly. The two staff members who were no longer needed for the heavy lifting were not dismissed. They were systematically reallocated to higher need areas in the plant.

SPEAKER_02 9:19

Which is a brilliant strategy. By freeing up two skilled workers, the plant significantly increased its overall agility.

SPEAKER_03 9:26

Yeah, they could run more machines simultaneously and boost total output without compromising worker welfare.

SPEAKER_02 9:32

And that efficiency boost led to a pretty incredible unexpected benefit for the workers.

SPEAKER_03 9:36

It did. The output increased so smoothly that plant management completely eliminated an entire overnight shift. Production used to start at 10 o'clock at night on Sunday. Now it starts at 6 o'clock in the morning on Monday.

SPEAKER_02 9:48

So the automation literally gave the line workers their Sunday nights back to spend with their families. That is a staggering metric of success. We always measure automation by units per hour. But returning Sunday nights to your workforce changes the whole narrative from the robot is taking our jobs to the robot gave us our weekends back.

SPEAKER_03 10:08

Absolutely. And this modernization went beyond just physical robots. They also adopted red zone software for real-time monitoring.

SPEAKER_02 10:15

Right, which eliminated 9,500 paper printouts every single month. But let me push back on this for a second.

SPEAKER_03 10:22

Sure, go ahead.

SPEAKER_02 10:22

Whenever a company talks about going paperless, it can sound like, you know, a purely environmental PR move.

SPEAKER_03 10:28

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 10:28

How did this digital shift actually impact the daily life of the line operator?

SPEAKER_03 10:33

Well, it is definitely not just PR. The true value is entirely focused on the worker's cognitive load.

SPEAKER_02 10:38

Cognitive load, okay.

SPEAKER_03 10:39

Yeah. Before this, every single action had to be logged manually on paper. Imagine clipboards getting misplaced, grease obscuring handwriting, and the anxiety of a massive paper audit.

SPEAKER_02 10:50

Right, which naturally leads to human error and mental fatigue.

SPEAKER_03 10:53

Exactly. The red zone software replaces all that with an active real-time digital framework. It generates timely alerts, prompting the operator when it is time to perform weighing procedures or check the metal detector.

SPEAKER_02 11:05

So it actively guides the operator through their shift instead of just being a passive piece of paper.

SPEAKER_03 11:11

Precisely. And if an operator misses a record, it alerts the supervisor in real time. It connects directly to product quality and strict compliance for international certifications.

SPEAKER_02 11:21

So just like the cobot removes the physical fatigue, the digitalization completely removes the mental fatigue and anxiety.

SPEAKER_03 11:29

Exactly. It reinforces the theme of utilizing technology to actively support the human worker.

SPEAKER_02 11:35

And this whole holistic approach resulted in a massive cultural victory for them, too. The integration project won second place globally within Griffith Food's internal orange bell recognition system.

SPEAKER_03 11:46

Yeah, it transitioned from an engineering project into a real symbol of collective pride for everyone at the plant.

SPEAKER_02 11:51

Which perfectly highlights why this case study is so vital. Yeah. I mean, the company is currently ranked as the fifth best place to work in Colombia.

SPEAKER_03 11:57

Fourth best for women, and in the top 200 for all of Latin America.

SPEAKER_02 12:02

It proves that adopting state-of-the-art robotics does not require sacrificing corporate culture. They use automation as an ally.

SPEAKER_03 12:10

Yeah, R.V. Aristazabel, a production operator there, summed it up perfectly. He said the robot does the heavy lifting of one or two people, but its true value is that it makes the human's work fundamentally easier and safer.

SPEAKER_02 12:23

It proves unequivocally that technological modernization does not have to come at the cost of human-centric values. When implemented correctly, it enhances them.

SPEAKER_03 12:33

Exactly. It forces a complete re-evaluation of how the industry approaches capital investments. The traditional ROI metrics are almost always just speed and labor cost reductions.

SPEAKER_02 12:43

Right, which leaves you with a final provocative thought to consider today. If those traditional ROI calculations only measure speed and immediate cost reductions, what would happen to the global manufacturing industry if return family time and conserved human physical energy were factored in as hard economic metrics for future technology investments?

SPEAKER_03 13:02

That is a really profound way to look at it.

SPEAKER_02 13:04

It is, right? Think back to that grueling gym routine we talked about at the start. When we stop forcing our workforce through thousands of daily joint destroying motions, we are not just saving their physical health. We are building a significantly more resilient, dedicated, and ultimately more productive manufacturing future.

SPEAKER_00 13:23

Thank you for listening to Through the Line Packaging and Processing. You can listen to more episodes on all streaming platforms. Be sure to visit us at packworld.com, profoodworld.com, and healthcarepackaging.com for more packaging and processing news. This podcast was edited by Bree Guns.