Case Studies

How a Food Manufacturer Built a Reusable Model for Bringing Sanitation In-House

4 minute read

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY: A leading food manufacturer set out to move sanitation from a third-party provider to its own workforce. The company started with a pilot at one site, learned where launch readiness was breaking down, and applied those lessons to a larger second facility. Catena Solutions supported the project across program development, workforce readiness, change management, and governance. In the weeks before the second launch, project completion rose from 34% to 84% in 22 days, the number of provider associates identified to transition reached 2.3 times the planning assumption, and the lessons from both sites became a reusable model for future conversions.

Project at a Glance:

• 2.3x the planning assumption: 95 incumbent sanitation associates identified to transition, versus about 42 planned
• 75% oriented: 71 of those 95 had completed orientation by the end of the engagement
• 34% to 84% in 22 days: 61 of 73 project tasks complete at the final pre-launch update, with none left non-started
• 710 applications and 105 accepted offers: The hiring pipeline at the project wrap snapshot
• 117-step model: A reusable plan with 13 readiness gates and 6 governance forums, built from two sites
• All SSOPs (100%) required development from the ground up, including the establishment of formal handover and governance processes to ensure effective implementation, accountability, and ongoing program oversight.

The Challenge: How Could the Food Manufacturer Bring Sanitation In-House?

A food manufacturer was treating sanitation as a contracted service. However, the company was still accountable for employee safety, food safety, and production readiness. Bringing the work in-house meant taking direct ownership of people, processes, facility conditions, records, and release decisions without disrupting production.

The pilot, which covered one production line, made the gaps visible. The line launched with fewer people than the planned staffing model called for, so the site covered the difference with a hybrid approach. The site still reported no injuries and no major food safety event during the initial launch period, but the launch exposed multiple gaps:

• Factory conditions and the effectiveness of third-party sanitation practices were found to be below acceptable standards, resulting in delayed production start-ups and extensive downtime required for additional cleaning and corrective sanitation activities.
• Established go/no-go criteria for the initial site were not adhered to, and the implementation timeline was accelerated by more than a month with limited advance notice, reducing the time available to ensure operational readiness.
• Finishing classroom training did not mean someone was ready to work independently on the floor.
• Quality and pre-operational inspection expectations were not fully aligned prior to go-live, and gaps in the Quality team’s pre-operational inspection skills and capabilities were identified.
• Equipment, chemical, and supply needs surfaced later than they should have.
• Project ownership existed, but partner functions did not always follow through at handoffs.

More hurdles were expected at the second facility. It was larger and in the middle of a major hiring push: more than 480 hires expected over ten weeks, about 37% above normal recruiting capacity. The sanitation model called for five supervisors, and only one was in process at early planning. Planning also assumed that only about 40% of the provider’s roughly 105 associates, about 42 people, would transition.

The Solution: How Did Catena Prepare the Organization to Take Ownership of Sanitation?

Catena worked with Operations, HR, Quality, Safety, Procurement, Training, and Sanitation from planning toward go-live. Rather than copy the pilot, the team treated the second facility as its own transformation and built around what the first one had taught.

• Leaders first. As part of the original implementation plan and established go/no-go criteria, managers, supervisors, leads, and trainers were required to be onboarded ahead of the hourly workforce to gain familiarity with plant operations, establish routines, and ensure readiness for full staffing. This requirement was successfully executed during the second plant start-up.
• Two workforce paths. The original plan established separate communication, application, clearance, and orientation processes for incumbent provider associates and external hires, with phased onboarding and off-cycle Saturday orientation sessions. While the accelerated timeline prevented full execution of this approach at the first plant, the planned onboarding processes were successfully implemented during the second plant start-up.
• Readiness beyond training. Each person’s path ran through hands-on training, observed sign-off, and supervisor authorization. Until those steps were finished, employees were marked Cleared, Supervised Only, or Restricted, each with an owner and a plan to close the gap.
• A Quality model built for ownership. Sanitation inspects its own areas first, Quality then verifies independently, working directly with the leader who owns the area. Repeat or systemic findings go into a startup issue log, and the release decision depends on evidence.
• Clear authority. Every deliverable had one accountable owner, and proof was required before a task was counted as done.
• A decision to protect readiness. Leadership moved the launch date back 44 days. The decision was about supervisor readiness, orientation capacity, and a clean handoff from the provider, not simply a delay.

The Benefit: How Did Organizational Readiness Enable Sanitation Internalization?

More people chose to transition than planned. By the end of the engagement, 95 incumbent associates had been identified to transition, 2.3 times the planning assumption and 53 more than expected. Of those, 71 (75%) had already completed orientation at the project wrap.

The hiring pipeline reached scale. The effort had drawn 710 applications and 105 accepted offers.

Readiness moved quickly. During the engagement, project completion rose from 34% to 84% in 22 days, with every remaining task in progress and none left non-started.

The pilot launched without injuries or a major food-safety event. That result covers the initial launch period at the pilot site, and it gave the team the evidence to design the controls that followed.

Additionally, the manufacturer now has a reusable operating model drawn from both sites:

• Corporate program documents, baseline site-level programs, and SSOPs to serve as templates for developing and implementing required programs across other sites.
• A seven-phase lifecycle, from assessment through stabilization and handoff
• A 117-step project plan, with each step naming the accountable role, the checker, the proof required, and the next handoff
• 13 readiness gates, from facility authorization to hypercare exit
• Six governance forums, from executive sponsor reviews to after-action
• 18 categories of required records
• Day 3, 7, 14, 30, 60, and 90 reviews after launch, so each site proves ownership before project support steps back

Enterprise standards stay consistent, while equipment, workforce, shift structure, and facility conditions are tailored locally.

By putting readiness ahead of the calendar and turning two sites’ lessons into a reusable model, Catena helped the manufacturer build a clearer, evidence-based path for bringing sanitation in-house at every facility that follows.