Depositor streamlines production for traditional ice-cream maker

Granny Gothards is a traditional ice-cream manufacturer located on Gothards Farm in Somerset, South West England. The milk for the company’s ice-cream products is collected fresh from the milking parlour each day, so the ice-cream comes from ‘pasture to pot’ in one day.

Committed to producing handmade ice-cream by traditional methods, Granny Gothards nevertheless wished to respond to growing customer demand and recognised the need to improve production processes, including the efficient filling of its ice-cream product into pots. The filling process by hand was proving both time consuming and labour intensive.

The company selected a depositor from Riggs Autopack, which was able to handle the ice-cream, with its large delicate inclusions, and produce a final product as aesthetically pleasing as if it was filled by hand.

Business owner Amanda Stansfield is very happy with her investment. “Riggs Autopack worked with us to provide a cost-effective solution. They built us a depositor that works perfectly and we can now confidently take on more orders for our small pots due to the extra capacity the depositor has given us. Since using the machine, we have been able to supply an independent cinema chain, theatres [and] private airline catering, as well as more retail outlets.”

The Riggs Autopack semi-automatic and automatic depositors are suitable for dosing hot and cold liquid, semi-liquid and suspended solid goods. They deposit a wide range of ready-meal products — such as stews, mashed potato, casseroles and curries — and are able to deposit fragile vegetables and cooked meats in sauce with particulates up to 38 mm cubed. The Riggs Autopack range is available in Australia from HBM Packaging Technologies.