Operations Manager for Fapco, Scott Sloniker, explained that Fapco has made small parts kitting and packaging its bread and butter since the company was founded.

“This is the fast turn business we started with. With automated parts sorting and kitting assembly machines in-house, such as our Kit-Veyors, small parts kitting and packaging that can overwhelm an in-house packaging department are standard procedure here at Fapco.”

THREE SECTIONS TO SMALL PARTS KITTING AND PACKAGING

Sloniker broke down the small parts kitting and packaging business into three segments. “The first is low volume kits – less than 50,000 units per year. Many times these jobs are hand packed in-house at the OEM parts supplier. At the other end of the spectrum are the high volume kits of over one million pieces a year, where it makes sense to invest in the automated equipment to package as the product comes off the production assembly line. The mid-tier segment with runs of 50,000 to one million kits per year is a perfect match for us.”

These markets in the middle, niche markets, are where Fapco shines. These markets usually include replacement part kits, short runs of specialty products produced in the states, and flow-through consolidation of parts from multiple suppliers that are too cumbersome for the manufacturing company to handle.

“This business is what our automated Kit-Veyor machines drive. We take bolts, washers, and nuts, items that will not nest together in the equipment, and package them into ready- to-assemble kits. Those are the types of hardware kits you see in anything from ready-to-assemble furniture to carburetor rebuild kits to retail parts packages. We can package the kit into bags, blister packs, a cold seal, clamshells, skin packs, chipboard or corrugated packaging – whatever the customer needs.”

“One of our greatest strengths in kit packaging is our partnership with fastener manufacturers. The combination of Fapco’s experience and equipment designed to efficiently package at competitive pricing for fastener manufacturers provides a lower total cost for them than kitting in-house,” stated Business Analyst, Mark Tumbleson of Fapco.

PARTNER WITH FAPCO FOR YOUR PARTS PURCHASING, CONSOLIDATING, INTEGRATED PACKAGING AND FULFILLMENT NEEDS

When it comes to volumes of kits under one million per year, Fapco can process these volume packaging system jobs without an OEM dealing directly with all the outside suppliers. Packaging of wide range small parts like overhaul or replacement kits where multiple outside suppliers of gaskets, seals and fasteners all ship to the OEM for sorting, consolidation, kitting, packaging and fulfillment, can be completely taken over by Fapco’s packaging system.

“We’re finding many customers don’t want to manage five to ten items, all coming in from different sources, with a small parts packaging operation in-house. Instead, they would prefer us to purchase, consolidate, kit, package, warehouse and fulfill orders for each kit. Instead of dealing with millions of parts they can just purchase the complete kitting system needed from Fapco,” said Sloniker.

More Than Small Parts Packaging and Kitting

Fapco has expanded its capabilities towards also purchasing and owning the materials, managing parts and inventory management and selling finished packaged goods to the distribution chain for OEMs. The benefit of partnering with Fapco is the customer no longer has to manage hundreds of thousands of individual component part numbers, but rather just a few thousand pre-packaged kits fulfilled when needed in the distribution chain. Fapco becomes the focal point for various OEM small parts packaging and distribution companies, thus reducing overhead, lowering labor, accounting and stocking cost.

MANUFACTURING COMPANIES BENEFIT FROM FAPCO’S PARTNERSHIPS WITH FASTENER COMPANIES

Fasteners are usually the key element inside any small parts package. Fapco’s close relationships with its fastener company partners increase the efficiency of small parts packaging services.

“Instead of us handing all the fastener inventory in-house, the fastener company manages the inventory management, then we order and pack it for our customer as needed. On the small parts kitting side, we manage the inventory based on the end customer needs,” said Sloniker. He explained this could include the OEM designating where to buy the fasteners and how many to have on hand. He said in this economy many manufacturers are going to smaller and smaller lot sizes. “They leverage having just enough inventory available with fastener companies and Fapco.”

THE GROWING TREND FOR SMALL PARTS KITTING, PACKAGING AND FULFILLMENT

Purchase and supplier agreements with Fapco for a small parts packaging kitting system are true partnerships with risk assumed by both parties. These include agreements for minimum buy quantities, order quantities, the numbers of kits per year and the quantities of materials to produce the kits. Labor and material costs are also a factor. Questions like, “How many times a year is Fapco going to that bin to pick and package? Does one component go into 15 other components and is there enough to handle both components? If one kit gets hotter than the others, how will the allocation change?” These are all questions that Fapco and its partner customers are used to working out to make each kitting assembly program efficient and profitable.

“Today we are seeing a trend in companies that would rather pay an outside supplier, even if its more expensive in the short run, so they don’t have the administrative overhead built into their costs. Labor, inventory management, overhead and transportation costs are all included when they do the numbers. They want to just call Fapco and say ‘we need 250 kits and we all do what we do best,” he said.

Sloniker concluded that this packaging system trend continues to build. “For the past five years Fapco has done business with many companies. Some that are terrified of packaging components correctly and consistently in-house, and to those companies that are not afraid of packaging in-house but can’t handle the financial burden of the inventory, labor and equipment that it takes to package products correctly on what they consider to be a large scale. We have the packaging machinery and solutions for both.”

GET TOP-TIER SMALL PARTS PACKAGING AND KITTING SERVICE WITH FAPCO

When you work with Fapco, you’ll be able to see a clear improvement in your business’s small parts kitting and packaging operations. Our packaging and kitting for small parts can help maintain efficiency while providing you with top-quality products. You don’t need to remain concerned about inadequate service and products when you work with Fapco.

In addition to small parts kitting and packaging, we offer many other contract packaging services for a wide range of industries and products. We can provide packaging solutions using kits, bags, blisters, clamshells, custom folding cartons, and other types of reliable packaging systems.

Get Started with Small Parts Packaging and Kitting Today

To start with the design and development of a custom small parts kitting and packaging, or one of our other wide range packaging solutions, such as bag packaging, contact Fapco today.

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Fapco’s automatic bagging equipment can process individual or multiple items into a poly bag that is either preprinted in up to six colors and/or individually printed with product identification on each unit.  Bagging is an inexpensive and efficient method to package items not requiring extensive protection; Fapco bagged more than seven million items last year.

For the retail point of purchase channel, Fapco’s capacity in blister packaging, clamshell packaging or shrink-wrapping is equally impressive.  A single blister packaging machine can run at rates of up to 18,000 units a day.

High volume parts packaging must be as agile and flexible as possible.  “If our customer needs us to provide single box parts or multi-box parts in an over-pack into a chipboard box, then in a corrugated box to be sent out individually in eight or ten box packs or even skid quantities, we can handle that,” said Kolecki. “There are even times that they want the raw stage parts right back at them to use in production, we can send it back in bulk. Keeping everything here in its raw state makes us more flexible.”

“Remember when you go into the big box stores you can buy one part, or you can buy a contractor pack of 24. Whether it’s a plumbing component or an electrical switch, we are prepared to package and fulfill products in any volume the customer requires,” he said.

Bar coding is usually pre-printed on the card or box but Fapco has the ability to run labels in high volumes as well.  “Bar codes can carry part and lot numbers or carry customer specific information or logos, whatever the customer needs.”

From a seasonal aspect, Kolecki explained Fapco provides a safety net for spikes in demand. “If they have automated equipment in-house, they may run millions year around, and then give us the overflow to handle when they have seasonal spikes in their business.  Whether it’s snow blower parts in the winter, lawn irrigation parts in the spring, or outboard motors in the summertime, when the customer gets hit with peak seasonal demand, that’s when we gear up with the additional capacity for our customers.”

Quick changeovers are also an important factor when looking for a private label parts supplier and a packaging partner.  “Labor is very expensive.  Fapco specializes in flexible setups to run different products and different product groups all in one day.  This is hard to do cost effectively in-house,” concluded Kolecki.

Whether its warehousing or our cold seal shrink wrap solutions, Fapco Inc. will work to help your business grow. Get Started with Fapco Inc. today!

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Fapco is heavily invested in machinery and automated systems, such as automated part kitting and parts procurement, to expedite any large volume small parts kitting and packaging challenge.

Steve Hurt, supervisor over a variety of Fapco’s automated systems, addressed this investment as he pointed out the attributes of the line in full production, “Just one of these bowl counters represents an investment of about $65,000.  It allows us to count small parts for packaging. We dump the bulk parts into the bowl, set the counter for a number to count, and an electronic eye counts the parts as they go into a hopper. Once it hits the count needed, it opens up the hopper then automatically drops it and seals it in the pre-printed bag,” he pointed out as the machine ran through its cycles.

The investment in these machines pays off by lowering the costs for Fapco customers and increasing the total efficiency of the operation.  “The first week running this set we did 250,000 parts in about four days in just one shift,” stated Hurt.

Automation gives Fapco the capability of packaging small parts into kits–such as six bolts, six nuts, and six washers bagged and labeled–at dramatically higher speeds and volumes than cumbersome in-house, hand packaging departments.

“We can also print out any information on the bag the customer wants.  A customer we have right now was hand bagging everything and were falling further behind each day.  After their first order ran they were amazed.  What took them one shift with six people working three days, we did it in one shift in one day with two people.  It’s an enormous savings on labor,” concluded Hurt.

Let Fapco’s Investment Pay Off for Your Company 

Fapco has the capabilities to provide you with some of the most reliable automated packaging for small parts. Using our solutions, you’ll benefit from packaging systems that can handle products in high volume while maintaining consistent efficiency and cost-effectiveness. Here are a couple of those specific systems that we can implement in our operations to give you the reliable packaging that you need for a wide range of products. You can learn even more about our processes when you consult with one of our packaging professionals for a complete custom packaging solution.

The Kit-Veyor

One Kit-Veyor has the capacity of fitting six bowls of different parts to be bagged together.  Six different parts are packaged into one bag automatically. The machine is loaded and then does the work with one operator. A precise scale at the end of the line double checks for missing components and expels any package with missing or extra parts.  The system is so adaptable it can be set up for a run in just a half an hour and can then run 50,000 pieces individually put in bags in one shift in any combination of kitting and packaging.

Label and Package to your Specifications

High-speed semi-automated systems such as Fapco’s Maximizer increase capacity for small to medium sized items (up to 3.5 in. X 3.5 in. X 10 in.)  This results in up to 20,000 units processed per shift.  Chipboard, clamshell, bagging, skin, blister packaging and up to six color printing is available in-house at Fapco.

Get Reliable Packaging for Small Parts in High-Volume at Fapco Today

Regardless of the specific needs of your application, you’ll be able to benefit from top-quality packaging solutions that serve as a worthwhile investment. Your products will be consistently protected from damage while helping ensure that your operations are efficient. We have all of the resources required to help you get exactly what you need today. Contact us today and one of our experts will be able to help you determine which solution is ideal for your business.

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