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On-Demand Labor for Food Manufacturing Companies

By
Steven Calhoun
August 20, 2021
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If you’re a food manufacturer, you deal with products that become worthless if they aren’t delivered on time. On top of that, there are angry people at the other end of the supply chain who will face hangry customers if they can’t stock their shelves. Who wants to lose money and get an earful about it?

Veryable works with many companies in food manufacturing who are solving the persistent on-time delivery challenge by flowing with fluctuating demand using on-demand labor.

In this article, you’ll learn how on-demand labor can help your company meet changing daily demands and deliver valuable food products on time.

 

How on-demand labor helps food manufacturers deliver on time

Imagine you’ve just received a huge shipment of avocados that arrived late from your supplier. It’s not your fault the shipment is late, but your customer doesn’t care and the avocados won’t stay fresh because they don’t care either.

If you don’t act quickly, the materials (avocados in this case) will ripen and become worthless. This makes meeting your lead time a necessity, not a mere suggestion.

Usually, you would be stuck trying to accomplish more work with the same people. That would mean overtime, which drives up your cost per unit. Or it might mean trying to staff up, but then you’re stuck with people standing around after you catch up on this backlog.

With on-demand labor, you wouldn’t need to overstaff or pay overtime to handle this order. You would be able to roll with the punches by bringing in the exact amount of extra workers you need to save the avocado shipment from certain doom.

Once the on-demand workers have finished the work, they carry on their way and you’re at your usual headcount. You can add the workers who performed well into a labor pool (like a bench for a sports team) so that you can easily invite them back in the future.

 

How on-demand labor solves your impossible labor problem

Food manufacturers know that a tight labor market means tough times. You know your work environment might not be the most attractive, so you can’t always count on the “fun at work” appeal. And you can’t outbid other industries with much higher pay or you will erode your margins.

The alternative is offering shorter periods of work, so workers can pick up as much or as little work as they want. This is attractive to on-demand workers, and allows you to match the labor you purchase precisely to the work completed. Instead of chasing new hires with incentives and trying to outbid the competition, you can invest in keeping your full-time staff around and meet any additional demand with on-demand labor.

This could look like smaller workloads, measured by the piece or hour, which are offered to on-demand workers who would prefer to squeeze in work at your facility between their other responsibilities, and aren’t always looking for full-time work.

To cover your needs into the future, you can save the workers you like into a labor pool, where you can easily contact them again with more opportunities. This will enable you to flex up and down to meet demand and solve your impossible labor problem.

 

Common tasks for on-demand workers in food manufacturing environments

  • Quality control
  • Sorting
  • Packing
  • Machine operation

On-demand workers in food production environments typically tackle tasks that arise from fluctuating demand due to the unpredictable nature of the industry. Whether that’s inspecting incoming food products, sorting varieties, packing and packaging, or operating and tending machines, on-demand workers have a variety of skills.

Some prefer to work by the piece, which means you would only pay for exactly the work that’s done. And the worker likes this because they are rewarded for efficiency with either more money in their pocket or more time in their day. 

Case Study: Pholicious

Leveraging on-demand labor has allowed PhoLicious to to take on any order – regardless of size or timeline.

Read Full Case Study

 

How to get started with on-demand labor

Getting started with on-demand labor is easy. You can sign up for a business profile with Veryable and post your first work opportunity today. You only pay when the work is completed. Create your free business profile to get started.

To learn more:

-Check out our Blog - POV: Continuous Improvement Leader, Food and Beverage Manufacturing

-Visit our homepage for food & beverage companies

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Steven Calhoun
Content Strategist

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