A $2.5 Million Packaging Line, Designed and Installed Under One Roof

Ion Nutritional Labs, a leading U.S. contract manufacturer of dietary supplements based in Largo, Florida, was building out a $25 million gummy expansion—the largest capital project in the company’s history. The expansion needed a dedicated, fully integrated high-speed packaging line that could handle gummies at speeds their existing tablet and capsule lines couldn’t match. Rather than sourcing and integrating individual equipment centers from multiple vendors, Ion turned to BW Packaging’s Integrated Packaging Solutions team to design, specify, and install the complete line as a single, turnkey project. As a result of this partnership,

Ion Nutritional Labs was able to:

• Deploy a fully integrated gummy packaging line—from bottle unscrambler through robotic palletizer—in approximately two to three weeks of on-site installation
• Achieve a level of automation and line speed that far exceeds its existing tablet and capsule operations
• Fit a complete high-speed line into a very tight 30,000-square-foot footprint through creative layout engineering
• Position the company for five to ten years of growth with equipment built to scale as the market demands

The Biggest Project in Company History

Ion Nutritional Labs is one of the largest contract manufacturers of dietary supplements in the United States. Operating out of approximately 300,000 square feet across two facilities in Largo, Florida, the company employs about 350 people and produces a full range of product formats—tablets, capsules, liquid capsules, cap-in-cap, stick pack powders, and now gummies—for some of the most recognized brands in the supplement industry. Ion’s existing packaging lines run in the range of 40 to 100 bottles per minute, handling the diverse format requirements of a high-mix contract manufacturing operation.

Gummies, however, represented something different. The gummy supplement market was growing fast, and Ion’s leadership saw an opportunity to build a dedicated gummy capability that would position the company for the next five to ten years of growth. The vision was ambitious: a $25 million buildout encompassing nearly 30,000 square feet of new space, two gummy production lines, drying capacity, R&D, design and formatting capabilities, and a dedicated high-speed packaging line.

The packaging line alone represented a $2.5 million investment. Ion wanted it to be faster than anything else in the facility, fully automated from bottle to pallet, and built with equipment that would last for years. They also needed it to fit within a very tight physical footprint—a constraint that would test the creativity of any line design team.

But the real challenge wasn’t any single piece of equipment. It was the integration. Ion’s leadership had operated other lines in the facility that lacked the level of automation and efficiency they were looking for. They knew from experience that buying individual machines from multiple vendors and trying to make them talk to each other creates friction, finger-pointing, and gaps. What they wanted was one company, one relationship, one point of accountability—from line design through installation and support.

One Company, One Line, One Point of Contact

When Ion first approached BW Packaging, the brief was refreshingly direct: here’s the space we’ve earmarked for the packaging line, here’s what we want to do, and we need someone to tell us what it looks like, what it entails, and how it’s laid out. In their words: they left it to Barry-Wehmiller to be the experts.

BW Packaging’s Integrated Packaging Solutions team took the lead. The team brought together expertise from across the organization—commercial, applications, electrical, mechanical, automation, design, and integration—to create a complete line design tailored to Ion’s specific requirements. A dedicated project manager was assigned as Ion’s single point of contact, with the full depth of BW’s engineering and technical resources accessible underneath that umbrella.

Ion’s leadership described the value of that structure in practical terms: having all those key partners under one company allowed them to work very quickly and get answers without going to several different sources. The quickness of BW’s quoting, the level of detail in the proposals, and the quality of the equipment all made an impression. So did the fact that BW is U.S.-based with domestic customer service—an important factor for a company investing $2.5 million in a line it expects to run for a decade.

The footprint constraint tested the design team’s ingenuity. The space Ion had allocated was tight—very tight. BW’s engineers developed a line layout that maintained full speed and integration while incorporating the turns and routing necessary to fit everything into the available area. Ion’s team described the result with candor: BW did amazing. They pulled it off and did it well.

A Complete Line, Bottle to Pallet

The integrated line BW Packaging designed and installed for Ion Nutritional Labs includes every station from the beginning of the packaging process to the end of the line: a bottle unscrambler that orients bottles in the correct direction, followed by a filler machine, an inline metal detector, a check weigher, a VideoJet system that inks expiration dates on the bottom of each bottle, a capper with an automated rejection system, a labeler, and end-of-line automation consisting of an automated case packer, a robotic palletizer, and a shrink wrap machine. Every piece of equipment on the line communicates with the others and feeds data back into Ion’s network.

Set Up for Success for the Next Decade

The installation took approximately two to three weeks—a timeline that Ion’s team described as really quick for a fully integrated, multi-station packaging line. The result is a production capability that Ion didn’t have before and that positions the company competitively in one of the fastest-growing segments of the supplement industry.

Automation That Changes the Game

Ion’s existing tablet and capsule lines run at 40 to 100 bottles per minute. The new gummy line was built to go faster. But more importantly, it was built with a level of automation that Ion’s leadership described as a competitive advantage. In the contract manufacturing world, where customers evaluate potential partners on cost, speed, and quality, the ability to quote new business with confidence that the line can deliver is directly tied to the technology behind it.

As Ion’s team put it: building a gummy line with integration and automation allowed them to be very cost competitive when quoting new business. That’s not a soft benefit. It’s a revenue driver.

A Fully Connected Line

Every piece of equipment on the line talks to every other piece of equipment—and talks to Ion’s network. The company is able to pull production data directly from the line and feed it into its own systems, giving management real-time visibility into output, performance, and quality. One of Ion’s requirements was remote diagnostic capability, allowing BW Packaging’s technicians and experts to troubleshoot issues immediately without an on-site visit. BW delivered that capability as part of the integrated package.

For a line manager, the difference is tangible. Ion’s packaging leadership described the line as state-of-the-art—equipment that gives them better control of the entire process and the confidence that they’re packing a quality product while hitting performance goals.

Broad Knowledge, Deep Expertise

Ion’s leadership was candid about what impressed them most: BW’s team demonstrated not only broad knowledge of different equipment but also very deep knowledge of that equipment. That combination—the ability to see the whole line and understand the details of each station—is what makes the Integrated Packaging Solutions model work. It’s also what allowed BW to identify cost-saving opportunities that Ion’s team was able to evaluate and act on during the design phase.

The BW team also went above and beyond on special requests throughout the project. Ion described the overall experience as pleasant—a word that carries more weight than it might seem in the context of a multi-million-dollar capital project with tight timelines and a constrained footprint.

For Ion Nutritional Labs, the gummy packaging line represents more than new capacity. It’s the infrastructure that supports the company’s growth strategy for the next five to ten years. The equipment is automated to scale up quickly and run at high speeds as the market demands. And it was designed, built, and installed by a single partner—one company, one relationship, one line that works. View the adjacent video to hear directly from the Ion Nutritional Labs team about their experience with BW Packaging’s Integrated Packaging Solutions.