Drug Co-Op Saves Four Production Hours/Shift with Mosca Bundler

Rochester Drug Cooperative (RDC), Rochester, NY is the nation’s fastest growing healthcare distributor. The privately held wholesaler is owned and directed by pharmacist-entrepreneurs who supply pharmaceutical drugs and OTC items to independent pharmacies in New York and Pennsylvania. Founded in 1905, RDC has combined the attributes of a powerful purchasing group with technology-driven distribution. RDC is ranked as the 8th largest wholesaler in the U.S. and currently services over 900 retail pharmacies, long-term care pharmacies, and home health care stores in the Northeast. RDC’s core business is full-line distribution. In the Fall of 2012, management brought in a warehousing and logistics systems specialist who redesigned the warehouse/shipping floor layout to improve the fulfillment process. The transformation included improvements for more efficient order picking and optimal product handling. One area specifically addressed by the German integrator Schaeffer, who coordinated the redesign, was securing the tote bins used for order fulfillment and shipping. Schaeffer chose Mosca TRP-5 bundlers to replace expensive, time consuming safety seals to secure totes. Prior to installing two high-speed, automatic strapping machines, line workers at RDC manually threaded safety seals through the tote box lids so pharmacy receivers could see immediately if any tampering had occurred prior to delivery.  Although effective for their purpose, besides being time consuming, the seals were safety issues when broken tabs littered the floor and posed a slip hazard.  The TRP-5 utilized here is a standard bundler with several tabletop, press and backstop options for conveyor line applications. The system will easily handle tubs, cartons and bundles. For RDC, Schaeffer chose a belt-driven conveyor top and traffic light warning system with an acoustic malfunction signal to alert machine operators of need for a strap coil change, system malfunction or backup. The system is capable of applying 30 straps per minute on average; […]