Having the correct ingredients in correct quantities for each batch is critical. This becomes tricky when you are making so many small batches of product. I am assuming that you use primarily dry ingredients, and that wet ingredients e.g. water is added immediately before production.
The only way to address this risk properly is to place the focus and responsibilities where it should be. Lets start with the job functions.
Production staff is there to do as per their group title, namely to produce. Yes, they do have certain checks to do, but those checks should be aligned with their process and making sure that their process runs well.
Checking of ingredients and recipes is something that happens outside of the actual production - before anything is produced. In bigger companies, this can include a wide variety of activities, from receiving and storage of raw materials, to activities such as water treatment, mixing etc. These activities will include "pre-batching" of ingredients. This will require a dedicated person(s) whose only job is to take one container of ingredient at a time and weigh it out in the required recipe amounts. Different recipes may require different amounts of the same ingredient. You will therefore end up with various storage shelves for the same ingredient, but each shelf stores pre-batched ingredients of different quantities.
They then prebatch the next ingredient and so on and so on.
Each of these prebatched ingredients must be labelled properly with the name of the ingredient, the quantity, the batch number, and date prebatched. A label printer is typically used for this.
Ingredients should be colour coded for specific recipes. In other words, each ingredients has its own square colour coded identification label. For example, let us say the identification and traceability labels for sugar is printed on square green labels. Sugar is used in a variety of different recipes. Each recipe is allocated its own colour code, e.g.
recipe 1: yellow
recipe 2: red
recipe 3: blue
recipe 4: green
recipe 5: black
recipe 6: pink
Each sugar bag will therefore have a green id label, plus one or more of the above coloured stickers. If recipies 4 to 6 use the same amount of sugar, then mark those bags with a green, black and pink sticker each. This makes picking for recipies so easy. Even an illiterate person can now do it correctly.
Prebatched ingredients are then issued to production for each recipe. Lets say recipe 2 is colour coded red. Then the prebatch person takes one red bag from each shelf, writes the batch number of each ingredient on the prebatch "issue to production" document, and places it all in a larger batch basket or bag along with the document.
When production comes to receive the batch ingredients, they have to check only three things:
- only "red" batch colour coded ingredients are in the basket or bag,
- if the recipe requires for example seven ingredients, all seven ingredients are in the batch basket.
- all seven are written on the issue document.
This check takes less than three minutes and they can co-sign on the receiving document.
