Coffee Fest in NY and Natural Products in CA + National Snack Food Month

February 26, 2019

Coffee Fest is happening in New York City at the Jacob Javits Center from 3-5 March 2019. We’ll be there with our distributor, U.S. Roaster Corp. We’ll be in Booth 2366. Almost immediately afterward, the Natural Products Expo West is in Anaheim, CA from 7-9 March 2019. We’ll be there with our distributor, Crystal Vision Packaging. If you’re there, stop by Booth 3893

Product and Customer News:
Being that February is National Snack Food Month, we thought we’d focus on that...both here and in Canada…!

Recently, Logical Machines gained another new customer: Nickel City Cheese, Canadian makers of cheese curds.  Appealing to those who love Poutine, Quebec’s and Canada’s favorite snack, it incorporates melted cheese curds on top of french fries, drizzled with brown gravy. These fine folks were adventurous enough to come all the way from just north of Sudbury, Ontario (10 hours drive each way) to test their product.

After another successful product testing session, with cheese curds moving smoothly through the S-6, we’re happy to gain another unique customer who’s leveraging gravity, vibration, and logic

Logical Q & A:
Q: “I need to calibrate by Logical Machines scale system. How do I do that?”
A: Good question. First, find yourself an item that has a known weight. Then go to your Logical Controller II (LCII) -- which should be turned on, of course -- and press 1 for Tare (to zero out the scale). Then press 3 for Utilities and then press 1 for Calibrate. Put the known weight item on the upper corner of (not inside of) the weigh hopper (or you can place it on the table scale, if it’s an S-5 model) and input the known weight amount and press the Enter button.

You should see on the screen of the LCII the weight that you’d entered. Then take the known weight off of the weigh hopper/table scale and the amount on the screen should go back to zero. If there is anything other than 0.000 showing, press Tare to zero out the scale. Replace the weight on the scale, press 3 for Utilities, press 1 for Calibrate, and then re-enter the same known weight amount and press Enter. Then take the known weight off of the weigh hopper/scale and you should see 0.000. That’s it -- you’ve calibrated your Logical Machine!

Factoids: Snack Foods

  • IRI research shows that as of 2018 there are four main snack food categories:
    • Wellness -- Inherently healthier &/or nutrition claims
    • Permissible Indulgence -- Products consumers feel are more permissible because they have less of or added benefits to their indulgent favorites
    • True Indulgence -- “Fully loaded” traditional categories
    • Treats -- Confections
  • The same report shows that Certified Organic snacks are projected to have a CAGR of +19% over the next three (3) years
  • Paleo-friendly plant-based snacks are rising in popularity as well, having grown +16.4%
  • Variety and convenience of packaged Meat/Cheese/Cracker/Dessert Snacks grew +45%
  • Packaging is key for growth -- 57% of consumers feel that calories/fat/sugar information on the package is important

Experts state that snack food companies should leverage packaging as your billboard for communicating your differentiation and benefits

National [fill-in-the-blank] Day:

Logical Flow Videos: A model S-6 weigh+fill of 1.5 oz. of Tortilla Chips* and an S-5 model with 30 lbs. of Strawberries**

Note: You can find a multitude of Logical Machines videos on our YouTube channel. These show a wide variety of product types being run through our range of machine models as well as tips on how best to Calibrate, Tare, and otherwise adjust and configure your weigh+fill scale system.

Logical Quote of the Week:

  • “I really regret eating healthy today...." -- Said No One Ever
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