Reducing tobacco waste

Challenge

Tobacco waste is a huge burden on any production: it increases the cost per cigarette, makes these costs difficult to calculate and adds process overheads, as well as further costs for reuse and recycling.

Solution

Tobacco Waste Prevention (TWP) from Körber Technologies is the first comprehensive consulting service that helps customers solve this problem right at its point of origin. It reduces the amount of waste generated by up to 60 percent – using only the equipment they already have.

In July 2020, Körber Technologies Consulting took on an ambitious chal­lenge: presenting a solution for reducing waste to various global player initiatives. The entire industry is currently work­ing on waste reduction. However, over the past few months, the team around Marco Castro, Head of Körber Technologies Consulting, has dared to think differently. Indeed, its members have pioneered a completely original approach, developing an integrated methodology for preventing waste at the points of origin in the GLT, Primary and Secondary. The concept can be applied to all production facilities, regardless of the ma­chine base. “Our approach is strictly based on the existing conditions of our customers’ brands,” explains Marco Castro. “This enables them to prevent waste quickly and successful­ly, maintaining these gains over the long term.” 

The figures already achieved in customer projects pro­vide an impressive measure of these successes: TWP can reduce the generation of waste in the GLT processes by up to 50 percent, in the Primary by up to 70 percent and in the Secondary by up to 60 percent. “The first step is to quantify the potential for waste prevention at the customer’s site,” explains Castro. “This is the basis on which we implement our TWP methodology, which aims to achieve the physical limits for waste prevention for the respective combination of blends, brands and equipment as quickly as possible. The consulting service is manufacturer­independent. As custom­ers implement the concepts themselves under our guid­ance, they can easily maintain these new optimum waste levels in their production environments over the long term.” The approaches adopted as part of TWP not only prevent waste, they also reduce production complexity and technical costs by standardizing brand and equipment combinations that are relevant to waste.  

No investment in equipment

The starting point for every TWP project is the custom­er’s own production facility. “This means that we not only strictly consider their specific blends and brands, but also implement the TWP specifically for their existing production equipment,” explains Castro. “No investments in equipment are necessary to achieve this new optimized level of waste and costs – at least initially. Of course, on request, we can advise our customers on the potential of machine upgrades or other changes to their equipment.”

Performance-based payment

The innovative payment concept underlines Körber Technologies’ belief in its new TWP service. “We are certain that we can deliver the savings we promise our customers after analyzing the situ­ation,” says Castro. “That is why payment for this service is performance­based. If we achieve less than we promise, the price is reduced. If the improvement falls below a set level, our clients pay nothing.”