Randy Hirschfield, senior field service engineer for WEM Automation, draws on nearly 50 years of feed mill experience to identify inventory control as the industry's biggest data challenge, especially as ingredients grow harder to source. He recommends barcoding as a practical starting point, giving mills real-time visibility into inventory for better production scheduling.
Hirschfield also stresses full data integration from receiving through loadout, allowing operators to track how new ingredients affect batching, pelleting, and pellet durability index (PDI). He notes that feed mills with constantly shifting formulas are uniquely difficult to analyze, unlike operations that run standardized batches.
Looking ahead, Hirschfield predicts mills will increasingly pair robust ERP systems with barcoding for full track-and-trace capability, enabling the AI-driven optimization most facilities can't achieve today.
Transcript of interview with Randy Hirschfield, senior field service engineer, WEM Automation
Elise Schafer, editor, Feed & Grain: Hi, everyone, and welcome to Feed & Grain Chat. I'm your host, Elise Schafer, editor of Feed & Grain. This edition of Feed & Grain Chat is brought to you by WATT Global Media and FeedandGrain.com. FeedandGrain.com is your source for the latest news, product and equipment information for the grain handling and feed manufacturing industries.
Today, I'm joined by Randy Hirschfield, senior field service engineer for WEM Automation. He's here to shed light on why data is key to feed mill performance and his tips for data management. Hi, Randy. Thanks for joining me today.
Randy Hirschfield, senior field service engineer, WEM Automation: Hello, thanks for inviting me.
Schafer: Now, if you could tell us a little bit about yourself, and then, tell us why before feed mill operators and managers can get meaningful insights from analytics or AI tools, they need a solid data foundation. What does that foundation look like and what is the biggest challenge feed mills face in building that today?
Hirschfield: I've been in the industry for 48, 49 years in August. I've been through everything, every development, new feed mills, ERP systems, new employees, training of many, many, people out there. So, I've been in more feed mills and I care to even count. That's a little about me.
And the [data] challenge is right now mainly inventory control from what I can see, what the market is bringing right now because products are getting harder to get. We're going more into different areas in the production of the mill. And I see mills, if they run out of product, they can't make feed or they've got to reschedule and they're hung up — they lose hours and hours of time. So, I see the biggest challenge for new mills or existing mills coming up right now for their data management would be inventory control.
Schafer: When it comes to improving data management, where should feed mills invest first? Automation infrastructure, data collection, cloud connectivity or somewhere else?
Hirschfield: A little of each, but right now I would say for mills that want to really keep up-to-date and everything, I would say we'd have to start going with more barcoding, so they know what's on, they know their inventory control, they know where it's at.
It's really important to know how much you have on hand at that mill at one time so you can schedule and produce. And with barcoding, anybody can do inventory control off of that.
Schafer: When companies begin evaluating analytics or AI initiatives, how important is data integration across the mill from receiving to loadout?
Hirschfield: Well, it's really important so that if they get a new ingredient, they can follow it, and through AI, they can actually see if it takes longer to batch. If it takes longer to batch, then it goes into pelleting. If they pellet it, a lot of ingredients have a high effect on pelleting. It takes longer to pellet. You've got to pellet at lower temperatures for certain ingredients, which is not good. You don't get a good PDI [pellet durability index] on the pellet if you do that. So, that's really important for the final product when it gets out to the customer.
Schafer: Feed mills generate enormous amounts of data every day. Which operational data points provide the greatest value for analytics, and how can dashboards and reporting tools uncover problems before they become costly?
Hirschfield: The hardest thing in a feed mill is production from day to day — formula day to day. It's different every day. It's different every hour, depend[ing] on moisture, temperature.
The feed mill industry is probably the hardest one for analytics to do. I mean, you’ve got to get a vast amount to give a good true mean of all the products that you're making. So many mills out there right now, they're just making a couple tons of feed for this, couple tons of feed for that.
Those are the hard ones to do. Your integrators that just make the same ones all day, you could do that real quick and just follow your formula and your pellet production all the way through to loadout, and that would make a real easy chart for you to follow.
Schafer: Randy, looking ahead five years, what do you think feed mills will be able to do with data and analytics and AI that most facilities can't do today? And what investments in data management need to happen first to make that possible?
Hirschfield: Well, what they're all going to need in the future is a good ERP system and a good integrator with that ERP system because they're going to be bringing in barcoding so they can track and trace all through the plant, which is going to be essential for any major mill that's going forward.
And that way they can use AI optimization with the data they're getting from the barcoding and ERP system to optimize their plant.
Schafer: Well, Randy, thank you so much for sharing your experience and advice with us today.
Hirschfield: Yep, thank you.
Schafer: Well, that's all for today's Feed & Grain Chat. If you'd like to see more videos like this, subscribe to our YouTube channel, sign up for the Industry Watch daily eNewsletter, or go to FeedandGrain.com and search for videos. Thanks again for watching, and we hope to see you next time!