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Poultry Processing Industry eTool
Follow-Up
 Plant-Wide Hazards
 Sanitation
 Receiving and Killing
 Evisceration
 Cutting and Deboning
 Packout
 Warehousing

Packout
Packaging is necessary to get the processed product from the plant to the consumer. It is generally a two-part procedure. First, the bird or bird parts are placed in a bag or package; and second, the package is placed in a shipping box. Poultry can be packaged in a wide variety of formats which range from minimal processing to maximum processing.

Packaging Options:
  • Whole Bird Bulk Packaging: The whole bird can be bulk boxed and sent to large users such as broiler restaurants or secondary processors.
  • Whole Bird Individual Packaging: The whole bird is individually bagged and boxed for supermarket sale.
  • Bone-In Product: Parts are packaged and sold as consumer product or as bulk sale for large commercial users.
  • Bone-Out Product: Parts are packaged and sold as consumer product or as bulk sale for large commercial users.
No matter how a bird is packaged it is almost always placed in a large cardboard box for shipping. The steps in building, filling, weighing, and stacking these boxes is almost always the same.
  • Task 1: Box Maker: Takes/makes hand-formed boxes or machine-formed boxes and puts them on conveyor.
  • Task 2: Box Packer: Packs birds into boxes for shipping.
  • Task 3: Scale Operator: Pulls boxes onto scales, adds or removes extra chicken.
  • Task 4: Box Sealer: Pushes air out of and seals box.
  • Task 5: Stack Off: Removes boxes from the conveyor and stacks on pallet.
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