Good and affordable sticker removing

LETS bv has been the innovative partner in the field of industrial cleaning systems and cleaning pump units for the food industry for almost 40 years. The team's approach is to provide an optimal and sustainable cleaning that food producing companies can rely on blindly. Commercial director Guustaaf Hoekstra takes us into the world of sticker removers.

Experience experts will confirm it immediately. Removing stickers from crates often goes 'so, so'. Sometimes it is only half successful. And if you're well on your way, you'll still see glue residue or half stickers. And all this in spite of the fact that hygiene requirements are extremely high nowadays. Rightly so, of course. After all, stickers can be a source of bacteria. But there are solutions.  LETS bv can provide crate washing installations with a de-sticker, after which the crate looks at its best again. In fact, LETS offers a guaranteed optimum cleaning result.

Customer-specific

Guustaaf: "We design, build, produce and maintain the crate washing machines under our own management. This is a challenge for our technical team every time, because every industry is different, of course. Companies in the fish processing industry have different requirements from meat processors or fruit and vegetable companies. It's all very client-specific. Still, every customer experiences the same problems, only the execution and the size vary enormously. Just take the number of types of crates that the industry uses. There are narrow, wide, deep or shallow crates. Or crates with sharp corners. holes, or no holes. So on and on."

Washing crates

The specialist from Dronten always bases his customer demand on a 'basic model' designed by LETS bv's technicians, Guustaaf continues his story: "We supply machines with a capacity of about 400 - 800 crates, but we also install crate washing machines that can handle 2,500 crates per hour, possibly up to 5,500 crates per hour".

LETS bv currently has about 35 employees. Four of them are continuously working on the development and design. Guustaaf: "In addition, our seven-man service and maintenance team is always on standby and on the move throughout the country. Our service vans full of spare parts are always close at hand when needed. We strive for a quick solution (within 24 hours) in the event of a malfunction or an unexpected problem."

Polder sobriety

It is no surprise that LETS bv has existed for almost 40 years. Is there a secret? "Working hard, taking the customer seriously, never sitting still, being open to improvements, being and remaining curious, combined with the sobriety of people from the polder area. Something like that", laughs Guustaaf, who has been part of the Dronten company since 1996. 

He gives an example when it comes to sustainability, water and energy saving: "Of course we are aware of that. How do you design a machine that can reuse as much water as possible? But there are limits, I think. After all, practice has shown that you need an percentage of the degree of refreshment. You just can't escape that. Yet we always manage to design washing machines that focus on water saving."

Spray pattern

Hygiene. Another hot item these days. "There's always room for profit there. We design machines with as few corners as possible. We remove the cables. The engine compartment is closed. Angled edges ensure that the water drains away logically and does not remain unnecessarily on the ground, which in turn can be a source of bacteria. The spray pattern is determined on the basis of the crate. We have developed a special machine for 'difficult' contamination such as baking residues, dried fish waste or dried vegetable waste. This machine cleans at high pressure and with a rotating force. These are the processes that we are constantly working on, along with the customer."

Talk about customer contacts. Customer experiences on the workfloor help us to take the quality of LETS machines to an even higher level, Guustaaf agrees: "We keep asking questions, we do that constantly. What do you need? How do you want to do that? Sometimes we carry out tests to see if we can translate the specific question into the machine."

Clean end result

Finally, Guustaaf lists another product with a clean and smart application: knife and glove cleaners. "Here, too, we try to combine hygiene with effectiveness. Take the personal knife baskets that employees in bakeries or fish processing companies, for example, have. While the employee washes his hands and has the boots cleaned, the basket is cleaned immediately. This is done in parallel with each other. This saves time and is much more effective. That's what we love to do. Listening to the customer and translating this into an innovative product with a clean end result."

www.letsbv.nl