Over the past five years, the Blender has produced nearly 750 million litres of drinks, with around 40,000 bottles leaving the production lines every hour on average. That makes the Blender much more than just a factory. It has become a central part of innocent’s European production and operations. The site is designed to keep things moving almost around the clock, producing juices and smoothies 24 hours a day, 364 days a year.
Robot dog on patrol
Modern production sometimes comes with four legs. SPOT, the Blender’s robot dog, supports the team by carrying out inspections across the production floor. On his rounds, SPOT takes temperature, vibration and acoustic measurements, helping the team gather important information about equipment and production processes and make maintenance more efficient.
But SPOT is just one of the developments the Blender has seen over the past five years. Just one year after opening, the site achieved FSSC 22000 certification, an internationally recognised standard for food safety management systems.
Less water, smarter heat
From the very beginning, the Blender was designed with the ambition to rethink production processes and make them more responsible.
One example is an air-based technology used to clean pipes, helping to reduce water consumption during production. The Blender also takes an innovative approach to energy. A complex system of electric heat pumps helps make efficient use of waste-heat generated during production, with the technology tailored specifically to the requirements of drinks manufacturing. It means the Blender can combine production at scale with a continuous drive to make its processes more efficient.
Behind every bottle are people
For all the clever technology, it is the people who have shaped the Blender over the past five years. Some team members have been there from the very beginning, watching an ambitious idea grow into innocent’s central production site. Among them is Chief Blender Gerard Voogd, who helped shape the Blender from the start five years ago, as well as innocent’s Supertasters, whose highly trained taste buds play a special role within the Blender team. Over the years, a real community has grown around the site. Several generations from the same families now work at the Blender, and there are even couples who first met while working there.
What started five years ago as an ambitious production project has therefore become more than an important part of innocent drinks’ business. It is a place where people and technology come together to help shape what the future of drinks production could look like.
