World’s Largest Stonefruit Grower Chooses NZ Co

Media Release
7 October 2003

World’s Largest Stonefruit Grower Chooses NZ Co

NZ technology is helping one of the world’s largest growers of stone fruit streamline its packing operations through smart automation.

Compac Sorting Equipment saw off local competition, to win the order to supply California fruit packing supremos Gerawan Farming with automated sorting, grading and packing machinery and software capable of handling the company’s mammoth 6,000 boxes an hour.

Gerawan president, Dan Gerawan, said he had initial reservations that Compac, being based in New Zealand, might not be as accessible or knowledgeable as one based in the US. “But,” he says, “We were wrong. The company was willing to agree to a local inventory and on-site service. We took them at their word – and they’ve kept it.”

He says Gerawan decided to try Compac, a relative newcomer to the US stone fruit packing industry, after the success of a smaller Compac unit installed to pack apricots at its California packhouse.

The win comes at a good time for Compac, which is currently riding a high in its US sales into the North America packhouses with its innovative blemish grading for citrus fruit and its NIR camera technology. Compac’s InVision 9000 blemish grading technology and packing machinery was selected for Sun Pacific’s mammoth new 10-acre citrus packhouse in California because of its well-proven track record in blemish grading. This single order comprised 40 lanes of pre-grade blemish grading machinery around 65 metres long and 12 lanes of final grade sizer stretching 70 metres long.

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About Compac Sorting Equipment:
- Manufacturers of high speed, accurate sorting systems for fruit and vegetables,
- Compac is a world leader in fruit sorting technology, through on-going commitment to research and development.
- Visit Compac at www.compacsort.com

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