Original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) have been quick to respond to increasing demands within the beverage industry by creating equipment that accommodates faster filling times, flexibility in processing, and quick handling of multiple SKUs.

When packaging beverages, the process to fill a container can require efficient practices as beverage-makers look to accommodate changeovers that commonly are associated with SKU proliferation.

With changes coming so fast, it can be tough to stay ahead of the game. However, marketers and other beverage industry executives searching for competing products in the consumer packaged goods (CPG) market might have a new tool to make things easier.

Yes, I am the rookie here at Beverage Industry, but I have no connection with the 1990 or the 2002 movies of the same name.

A trip to the local retail store can be an enlightening experience. Because of the considerable amount of SKU proliferation, a retail shelf might look quite different from one month to the next.

Although the term “flexibility” often is used to describe expectations for beverage industry equipment, in terms of labeling equipment, there still is a place for more rigid machines dedicated to specific operations, notes Raul Matos, vice president of sales and marketing at Miami-based Karlville Development LLC.

In a recently completed survey of 250 companies with direct-store-delivery (DSD) operations, nearly two-thirds of respondents stated that their businesses are becoming more complicated, according to survey sponsor Intermec, an Everett, Wash.-based subsidiary of Honeywell Scanning and Mobility.

Although SKU proliferation is nothing new to the beverage industry, the phenomenon still is causing many warehouses to explore different ways to accommodate these growing product lines.

Based in Draper, Utah, Swire Coca-Cola USA historically has served mostly rural areas in 11 Western states.

Accumulating 130 additional SKUs within the last five years to reach nearly 500 total SKUs, Beverage Industry Bottler of the Year Swire Coca-Cola USA was pressed to find a warehousing solution to accommodate this proliferation.