Gladfield Malt began as a small family business two decades ago, producing malt for craft brewers in Canterbury, New Zealand. These days they’re working with more than 1,600 breweries locally and around the world. As operations grew, so did their need for smart, effective and enduring packaging solutions.
Have you ever wondered about the ingredients that go into crafting a truly delectable craft beer, or a purely sublime whisky?
The Michaels are a fifth-generation family of barley growers. In 2004, Doug and Gabi Michael established Gladfield Malt, producing high-quality, all-natural malts for beer and whisky makers.
Without the Michaels’ malts, many of our favourite craft beers (and whisky) wouldn’t exist. Or, at least, they wouldn’t taste half as good.
“We started out as a family business around 20 years ago, supplying small craft breweries,” explains Doug. “Now, our kids are getting involved and we’ve grown to have 1,600 customers locally and worldwide. It has become quite a complicated business.”
Such complications require specialist expertise. Smart Pack has been working with the Gladfield team on their packaging and inventory management since 2018.
“Leon and his (Smart Pack) partners were the perfect team to help us get through some of those tricky issues,” says Doug.
Malt is made from cereal grains that have been malted. The process includes steeping, germination and kilning the grains. We’ll leave the proper explanation up to the experts. However, due to the unique processing methods involved, how malt is packaged and transported is essential to preserving its quality (and, by extension, the quality of the beer and whiskey that’s made with it).
Bespoke bags for the malt industry – a lot goes into one bag
One of the challenges was designing a bag that could ensure quality while also managing the different bulk densities of the malt – all while helping Gladfield Malt automate their processes for different markets.
Each market had different pallet sizes, so we needed to create a standard bag that could be stacked in various configurations to maximise the use of space.
“It changes the way you perceive the bag, from receiving it and opening it to how you handle it and how it is received at the brewery end,”
“Smart Pack persevered with us; they gave us plenty of different options to look at and we trialled different things,” says Doug. “It took a while, but we got there and it’s worked out really successfully.”
The result was a unique design: a square bottom gusseted bag that can be stacked in five layers on different types of pallet. The new design also maximised the branding real estate when stacked.
Gabi says that working with the Smart Pack team and designing a bag from scratch was “pretty exciting.”
“It changes the way you perceive the bag, from receiving it and opening it to how you handle it and how it is received at the brewery end,” she says.
“We engaged with graphic designers to come up with something that stands out from far away and what we love about it is that we said to Smart Pack: this is what we want to do. And Smart Pack just said: give us the design, we’ll make sure that’s in the bag.”
Bag inventory management – what’s needed when and where.
The graphic design of the malt packaging is also essential to managing product inventory. Early feedback from brewers told us that it was tricky to quickly identify which malt was which. The two companies came up with a colour-coding system.
With the ideal bag scoped, designed and constructed, the Smart Pack team now ensures supply keeps pace with the needs of the fast-growing business.
“We live by the mantra: no bag, no business.”
“For us, this is a non-negotiable,” says Smart Pack’s Managing Director Leon Currie. “We live by the mantra: no bag, no business.”
“Getting the inventory management right de-risks the business. It enables them to optimize their cashflow, their working capital, and their warehouse space.”
Blake Currie is focused in his work here, assisting daily with Vendor Managed Inventory (VMI) and working closely with Warehouse Manager Nigel Reid.
“I would rate the management of our inventory as top-notch,” says Nigel. “Smart Pack absolutely delivers the service and solutions for Gladfield Malt that make our life easier. I don’t believe there is another company that is doing it any better.”
The mutual respect between the two companies didn’t happen by accident.
“This has been a journey we worked on together that was progressed quickly with accuracy,” says Leon. “It was a partnership with a tight relationship allowing all parties to work to their strengths. They (Gladfield Malt) have an awesome story, a cool product, and they’re great to work with.”
The unique nature of the product has required careful planning, development, and packaging innovation from the early design phase to inventory management.
So, the next time you sip on a tasty drink, toast Gladfield Malt and all the processes that go into moving grain to glass.
If you have a commercial business that needs bespoke packaging design and inventory management to optimise processes and sales, get in touch.