Improvements in data and research in the last 50 years have been the catalyst for innovation across food manufacturing. Whether it’s been advancements in efficiency or the roll-out of more sustainable practices, the food and drink sector has been at the forefront of widescale changes that have - and are - making a significant impact to the world that we live in.
From the rise of automated machinery to the roll-out of artificial intelligence, the changes have been monumental and in direct response to the ever-changing demands of consumers and the evolving food system.
Brought to you by the UK Food & Drink Shows, FoodEx Manufacturing Solutions, and Food Manufacture; and making its debut at the FoodEx show this year is a 10-minute documentary exploring the past, present and future of manufacturing.
The film features several key experts and will play every 30 mins from 10am on stand J41 within Foodex Manufacturing Solutions.
FoodEx Manufacturing Solutions takes place on 7-9 April 2025 at NEC Birmingham. For more information, visit: www.foodex.co.uk.
In the meantime, enjoy this teaser!
The past
Mono Equipment’s Simon Moon began his career in the sector aged 17 via a youth training scheme.
“I think I was on around £27 a week,” he recalled.
Today, he works as the sales director for Mono Equipment – a leading designer and manufacturer of bakery and food service equipment in the UK.
The company supplies many of the UK’s leading supermarket chains, independent artisan bakers, hotels, restaurants and retail outlets. With an established reputation within the industry for creating high quality, innovative products, the company boasts a proud heritage of British craftsmanship which can be traced back to its origins in 1947.
Liam Smith works at fellow machinery firm Multivac UK, having first started there 14 years ago as a service technician. He is now head of product management.
Multivac is a family-owned business with its headquarters in south Germany. Its UK site, where Smith works, is based in Swindon.
Reflecting on the past, Smith said the manufacturing world has changed from customers asking for standalone, power-heavy machines, to companies like Multivac needing to provide whole solutions.
“If we look back 15-30 years ago, customers might ask for an individual standalone machine. That’s totally changed now, customers want us, as Multivac UK, to product manage the entire thing, they want a full line solution, to produce the label where possible and keep that really efficient so they can compete in a really competitive market.”
Nigel Paine is the vice president of production at Carlsberg Britvic where he’s worked since 2004 under its many guises and within various roles.
He started his F&B career as a sales assistant at Odd Bins in September 1992. By October, he was the assistant manager, and by November, the manager.
“The difference between then and now is all about automation and technology,” Paine said.
“I used to get everything from a thermal printer, my outputs from machinery, I had a pager I used to carry round factories,” he reminisced.
“It was slower technology. You just couldn’t have your finger on the pulse.”
He added that the crews were much bigger too, with several hundred working in factory compared to Carlsberg Britvic’s 200 today. Despite the lower headcount, the efficiencies are much greater with the entire process much more streamlined.
Susan Nash has been involved in FMCG manufacturer for 40 years, focused specifically in food manufacturing for the last 28 years after she started out as a brand manager in 1996. Today she works as Mondelez International’s communication manager.
“When I started in marketing it was the role of marketing to forecast demand, and our approach was very linear using software and getting verbatim input from sales. Now it’s fully integrated, it’s a science, with sophisticated modelling integrated into raw material supply and helping us to hold optimal inventory to meet forecasts and be adaptable in the short term as well as minimising waste,” Nash said.
Sarah Foden joined the industry in 1988, starting out in the Cadbury library and information service, which 35 years later, has been transformed into the archive it is today.
Foden remains at Cadbury UK, where she works as the information manager.
“Thinking about the food manufacturing industry when I first started…it was overall less sophisticated, less elaborate and less complex than it is today. But the need to produce great tasting product has not changed and nor has the need to invest in manufacturing. And we have invested £272 million in manufacturing between 2012 and 2021,” Foden said.
The present and future
As the experts go on to elaborate, today’s food and drink sector is much more automated, with all aspects of the food and drink chain focused on driving down its emissions.
And the implementation of tech is only going to intensify as we work to achieve goals such as reaching net zero and address challenges like the on-going labour gap.
Speaking on the latter, Paine said: “To bring top talent in it’s about recognising what jobs there are in the future and making them more accessible. That could be as simple as not having people to work on a night shift, it could be flexible hours. A lot of companies have the opportunity to work from home, it’s a little harder in manufacturing but with digitalisation we can move that way.”
For Smith, he says the future will be even more data-centric, with people demanding more information than ever before – and this is an area Multivac is investing in itself.
He added that further automation in the form of autonomous factory vehicles powered by AI will also become the norm.
