Contract packer and co-packer of RTD beverages in aluminum cans, running 24/7 filling, cartoning, warehousing, and repacking operations in Portland, Oregon.
Portland Bottling Company is a contract packer and co-packer of ready-to-drink beverages in aluminum cans, operating in Portland, Oregon since 1924. The company runs 24/7 production across roughly 500,000 square feet of production, storage, and repacking facilities, serving national brands and independent companies in the Pacific Northwest. Its primary filling lines are rated at up to 1,450 cans per minute, which places hard constraints on line speed, changeover, defect detection, and downstream material handling - the high-throughput environment in which its automation and monitoring systems operate.
Scope of work covers the full packaging chain: aluminum can filling, secondary packaging and cartoning, warehousing, and repacking. Automated inline monitoring runs throughout production, paired with on-site quality assurance laboratories. Quality systems are documented and audited: the facility is FSSC 22000 certified and operates under HACCP, so instrumentation, data logging, and process control decisions are subject to food-safety traceability requirements as well as throughput targets.
For engineering roles, the relevant surface area is a mix of high-speed filling and cartoning equipment, inline sensing and monitoring, and the data path from machine-level signals to QA and production records - all running continuously with 24/7 warehouse security and operations. The product mix spans juice-based beverages, energy drinks, functional beverages, and sparkling waters, so lines handle multiple SKUs and brand partners rather than a single product.
