WENATCHEE, WA - You can see for yourself what peak production of cherry season production looks like at CMI’s new McDougall and Sons Baker Flats facility.
During last season’s peak, the company maneuvered a drone through the “organized chaos” of cherry packing, with everything from close up footage to flyovers.
“It’s such a fast and furious process and we knew customers and consumers would enjoy seeing this unique behind the scenes footage,” Steve Lutz, Vice President of Marketing for CMI said in a press release, commenting that state-of-the-art cherry packing is spectacular to see. “We pushed the drone to get as close to the action as possible showing our magnificent cherry packing operation, from giant waterslides to gleaming stainless machinery and state of the art technology.”
Now you can see for yourself the inner workings in the newly-released video below.
The new 80,000-square-foot Baker Flats facility processes 15 tons of cherries-per-hour, including technological improvements that CMI said supersedes past production by 50 percent.
“Our new Red and Rainier cherry lines exceeded every expectation last season and we’re anticipating even greater performance when we launch the 2016 season next week,” said Bryon McDougall, Operations Manager for the McDougall and Sons facility. “The sizing accuracy and defect sorting is raising the bar on quality and is a true testament to the effectiveness of this new sorting and packing technology.”
The new cherry facility, third in a series of improvements in packing technology by facilities CMI is affiliated with, requires a “virtual army of pickers” to keep supplies of freshly picked cherries available to run across the production line, the company said.
“Using this technology to raise the bar on quality means less shelf shrink for retailers and a better product for consumers to take home,” said McDougall.
All fresh cherries are hand-harvested, however, because of how delicate the fruit is.
Packing cherries across a double shift, thousands of pickers are required to have sufficient fruit to keep the line running. A trained and experienced crew of 30 pickers can harvest about one ton of fresh cherries-per-hour, according to CMI.
“Our goal was to use technology that would allow us to efficiently deliver the best and most consistent quality to our customers,” said Bryon McDougall. “We feel we’ve achieved that goal and will continue to push to exceed it.”
CMI’s Northwest cherries start shipping June 1st, with sales peaking mid-June through early July.
