Food Packaging Machines for Australian Food Manufacturers: Which Machine for Which Product
Food packaging machine is a category, not a machine. Whether you call it a food packing machine, a food wrapping machine or a packing machine for food products, the question is the same: which one packs your product? A bag of nuts, a wrapped muesli bar, a bottle of sauce, a sachet of mustard, a tub of hummus and a punnet of berries are all packed by different equipment. This guide is for Australian food manufacturers working out which machine packs which product. It maps the common food formats to the machines that pack them, covers the labelling, coding and end-of-line stages that follow, and lists what to check before buying food packaging equipment in Australia.
Food packaging versus food processing
Processing equipment changes the food: it mixes, portions, forms, cooks or freezes it. Packaging equipment leaves the food alone and puts it in a pack: it bags, wraps, fills, seals, caps, labels and codes. The handover is usually a cooling conveyor or a hopper. This guide covers the packaging side. For dough dividers, encrusting machines and tray panning, see our guide to food processing equipment for bakeries and formed foods.
Which food packaging machine for which product
| Food product | Pack format | Machine |
|---|---|---|
| Snacks, nuts, dried fruit, confectionery, rice, pulses, frozen vegetables, pet food | Pillow bag, gusseted bag, stand-up bag from roll film | VFFS bagger with a multihead weigher |
| Flour, milk powder, spices, protein, coffee, drink mixes | Bag or stand-up pouch | VFFS bagger with an auger, or a premade pouch machine with a dual auger |
| Muesli bars, biscuits, bread rolls, muffins, wraps, chocolate | Flow-wrapped pillow pack | Flow wrapper |
| Sauces, dressings, juices, syrups, oils, honey | Bottle or jar with a cap | Liquid filling machine and capping machine |
| Condiment portions, instant coffee, sugar, electrolyte mixes | Sachet or stick pack | Sachet machine or stick pack machine |
| Granola, premium coffee, snacks with a zipper | Printed stand-up pouch | Rotary premade pouch machine |
| Dips, hummus, yoghurt, desserts, ready meals | Tub or cup with film seal and lid | Rotary tub filling machine |
| Berries, tomatoes, fresh produce | Punnet or tray with a label | Punnet and tray labelling machine |
Bagging: vertical form fill seal
A VFFS machine forms a bag from a roll of film, drops the product in and seals it, in one pass. It is the standard machine for anything that pours: snacks, nuts, rice, frozen vegetables, pet food and powders. The dosing unit is matched to the product, a multihead weigher for pieces, an auger for powders, a volumetric cup for free-flowing granules, and the bag style runs from a plain pillow bag to a quad-seal bag with a zipper. Because the bag is formed from reel film, it gives the lowest packaging cost per bag. Nexus supplies the printed laminated film as well as the machine, so both come from one supplier.
Wrapping: flow wrappers
Solid products that need to lie flat, such as bars, biscuits, bread rolls and wraps, go on a flow wrapper. The product is fed along a chain, film is formed into a tube around it and sealed at each end, and a photocell keeps the printed graphics in the same place on every pack. The entry-level flow wrapper is the usual first machine for a bakery moving off hand wrapping. The servo model runs up to 60 packs per minute with stored recipes per product, and on delta robot food packaging lines a pick and place robot loads the chain instead of operators. Gas flushing before sealing extends shelf life on bakery and fresh products. Our guide to flow wrap packaging covers the format.
Filling: sauces, dressings and liquids
Liquid foods are filled into bottles and jars by a liquid filling machine chosen by viscosity: overflow or gravity fillers for juices and thin syrups, servo piston fillers for sauces and oils, rotary lobe pump fillers for chunky sauces and thick dressings. A capping machine then tightens the cap to a set torque, at up to 20 containers per minute on the entry-level automatic capper and 40 on the high-speed in-line capper. For dips, yoghurt and desserts, the rotary tub filling machine denests the tub, fills it, applies a film seal and a lid, and ejects it, at 15 to 20 tubs per minute on one small rotary table.
Single serves: sachets and stick packs
Condiment portions, sugar sticks, instant coffee and electrolyte mixes run on a sachet packing machine or a stick pack machine. Both form the pack from film, dose the product and seal it in one cycle. A single-lane sachet machine runs up to 40 sachets per minute, and the stick pack machine runs up to ten lanes side by side for high-volume sugar and coffee packing. Our guide to sachet vs stick pack vs pouch compares the formats.
Labelling and date coding for food
Every food pack in Australia carries a date mark and a batch or lot code, and most retail packs carry a label with ingredients, allergens and nutrition information. On a bagging or flow wrap line, a thermal transfer overprinter prints the date and batch onto the film before it wraps the product. On bottles, jars and tubs, a food labelling machine applies the label after capping. Food labelling machines are standard pressure-sensitive labellers with food-grade construction. A continuous inkjet printer codes the container directly, and thermal inkjet printers for food packaging are the solvent-free option with sealed ink cartridges and nothing to clean; see the thermal inkjet printer range. Cartons and cases carry batch, date and barcode labels from a print and apply system.
Secondary packing and end of line
After the primary pack, product is collated into cartons by a cartoning system, the cartons are labelled, and a cobot palletiser stacks them on the pallet. A cobot palletiser suits a food plant where floor space is tight and the pattern changes with the product, because it runs without a safety cage and stores each pattern as a recipe.
Food-grade construction
Food packaging machines are built with stainless steel product contact parts, tool-free changeover between pack sizes and surfaces that can be wiped down or washed down between products. Allergen changeover is the point to check: a machine that strips down in minutes between a nut product and a nut-free one saves a shift of cleaning every week.
Small food producers
A small producer does not need an automatic line. A semi-automatic filler, a benchtop capper and a benchtop labeller pack a few hundred bottles or jars an hour with one operator, and the entry-level flow wrapper covers a bakery's first move off hand wrapping. Our guide to semi-automatic versus fully automatic packaging machines covers when to step up.
What to check before buying food packaging equipment in Australia
| Question | Why it matters |
|---|---|
| What is the product, and does it pour, lie flat or need to be pumped? | Decides bagger, wrapper or filler before anything else. |
| What pack format does your retailer or channel expect? | A stand-up pouch with a zipper is a different machine from a pillow bag of the same product. |
| What output now, and in two years? | Sets machine size and whether a second lane or a second machine is the growth path. |
| How many products, and how many contain allergens? | Changeover and cleaning time decide the day, not top speed. |
| What date coding and labelling does the pack need? | Sets whether the coder prints on film, on the container or on a label. |
| Who installs, commissions and supports it? | Nexus installs and commissions what it supplies, trains operators and holds common spare parts in Australia. |
Food packaging machines supplied Australia-wide
Nexus Australia supplies, installs and commissions food packaging machinery from its base in Belmont, Western Australia, to food manufacturers in every state, with installations in the last three years in Perth, Melbourne, Shepparton, Sydney, Brisbane and Adelaide. Nexus is a member of the Australian Packaging and Processing Machinery Association. Machines are built to the product and pack, with a lead time to shipment of around 75 days for a standard machine and 90 to 120 days for a complex line, a one-year return-to-base warranty, operator training and free remote support. Because Nexus supplies bagging, wrapping, filling, capping, labelling, coding, cartoning and palletising, sourced through its OEM network of food packaging machinery manufacturers, a food line can be specified as one system.
Frequently asked questions
What is the difference between food packaging equipment and food processing equipment?
Processing equipment changes the food by mixing, portioning, forming or cooking it. Packaging equipment puts the finished food into a pack. Most plants have both, with the handover at a cooling conveyor or hopper.
Which machine packs frozen food?
Frozen vegetables, seafood and pieces run on a VFFS bagger with a multihead weigher. Frozen bakery items and bars run on a flow wrapper. Both need film and adhesives specified for cold storage.
Can one machine pack both powders and pieces?
A VFFS bagger can, with a change of dosing unit: an auger for the powder and a weigher for the pieces. It is usually simpler to specify the machine for the harder of the two products and confirm the other runs on it.
Which printer codes food packaging?
A thermal transfer overprinter prints dates and batch codes onto film on bagging and flow wrap lines. A thermal inkjet or continuous inkjet printer codes bottles, jars, tubs and cartons directly.
Related machines and guides
- VFFS machines
- Flow wrappers
- Sachet packing machines
- Rotary tub filling machine
- Packaging machines in Australia: buyer's guide
- VFFS vs HFFS explained
Send Nexus Australia your product, the pack format you sell in and your target output, and the team will recommend the machine and the line around it. Contact Nexus Australia for a quote.
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