Steve Peirce, Co-founder and President of RIBUS, said the new production facility comes from market demand for RIBUS’ clean label ingredients, specifically Nu-FLOW.
Nu-FLOW, also known as “The Synthetics Replacer,'' gives manufacturers the option to replace synthetics or other anti-caking agents including silicone dioxide, tri-calcium phosphate (or talc), with a natural or certified organic ingredient. By using Nu-FLOW, producers can list ‘rice hulls’ on its label, making it clean, while also solving anti-caking, flow and other manufacturing and production challenges. Nu-FLOW is made from rice hulls that are steam sterilized and ground to a fine powder producing a natural alternative to silicon dioxide or other anti-caking or flow agents.
Peirce explained that the biggest difference between the old and new facility is efficiency.
“We used one facility for grinding and had to bag up the material and then we shipped it another 20 or 30 miles down the road for sterilization and packaging. Now, we have both of those elements under the same roof.”
RIBUS chose the city of Sparks specifically because that’s where its contract manufacturers are located.
“So now we can use our facility and their facilities together as needed. And the way we have explained it to our customers is we're taking steps and making investments to minimize future price increases. We have invested very heavily in automation, automatic truck unloading rather than loading it into tote bags and taking more labor and more time,” said Peirce.
