There are many things in this life that we have come to take for granted. Take for example all the packaging that we use on a daily basis. Have you ever stopped to think about how much packaging just one person can use in a day? It's absolutely astounding, and yet we hardly ever give it a second thought, it has just become a way of life for us. Whatever you use on a daily basis, multiply that by 6 billion or so and you will get some idea of how important packaging has become in our every day lives.

So who does all this packaging? It used to be that there were teams of factory workers who stood beside a conveyor belt all day picking up items and putting them in their proper containers, but that is just not feasible anymore. The demand has become so great for packaged goods that technology has had to catch up and come with automated packaging machines. This is not a new revelation, packaging machines have been around in one guise or another for decades, and there are so many different types of packaging machines that it just boggles the mind. Here's just a few...

Packaging Machines for Boxes - Boxes hold an important role in consumer America, and indeed around the world. When we talk about boxes, we are talking about everything from cereal boxes to boxes that refrigerators are stored in. There are literally millions of different types of boxes, and for most boxes there is a packaging machine designed to fill it.

Packaging Machines for Bottles, Jars and Cans - Usually, bottles and cans hold liquids, and so there are specialised packaging machines that are specifically designed to "squirt" these liquids into the right shaped and sized bottle or can. Everything from Coca Cola to Ketchup is pushed into their containers using these machines, and they do so at a blistering speed. Of course, it's not only liquids that are stored in cans, jars and bottles. Think of tinned salmon, peanut butter, motor oil, and all the other items that are stored in these containers, and you will get a bit of an idea of how large this industry is.

Shrink Wrap Packaging Machines - These machines will cover the item being packaged in a film of plastic and then "shrink" the plastic over the item using heat. This seals in freshness and keeps out bacterias and other bad things such as dust.

Every industry has different standards that must be followed when it comes to packaging of goods. For example, the food industry has to be particularly careful about how their foodstuffs are packaged, and packaging machines have had to adapt to changes in these standards. The same is true for the pharmeceutical industry, medicines need to be tamper proof for health and safety reasons. Chemicals also need to given a lot of consideration when packaging.

Packaging Machines Replacing Employees

As mentioned previously, packaging machines have been around for a long long time. They started off as very manual machines that needed constant supervision by a team of highly trained professionals. Nowadays however, packaging machines have evolved to the point where they are almost completely automated. I say almost because there is really no such thing as a fully automated machine of any type. Machines always break down, no matter how well they are designed and built, and will always need a qualified maintenance person to keep them going. There are of course still many manual packaging machines on the market. Not all companies can afford a fully automated packaging machine, they can be very cost restrictive. As a result, you can choose from fully manual machines, semi automatic machines and "fully" automatic, depending on how much you are able to spend and how automated you want your business processes to be. A lot of the automated machines have motion sensors built into them, which allow them to dedect when a product is ready to be picked up and packed. It's this motion sensor technology which really adds to the cost of the machine.

Packaging machines have certainly reduced the need for a lot of employees in many factories, and this has caused a lot of people to lose their jobs over the years. It's an ongoing argument as to which is more important - keeping up with demand by automating processes, or keeping people gainfully employed at the cost of industrial progress. For most companies, the bottom line is all that matters, and that is why packaging machines continue to grow and thrive in this industry.