Pearson Packaging Systems, the longtime West Plains maker of packaging equipment, appears to be roaring back from the recession, invigorated by a new product and a change in strategy that has focused the company on selling complete systems rather than individual machines.

The company, which makes machinery used to organize and package mass-produced products, posted its highest-ever quarterly sales volume during the fourth quarter, following slow volume earlier in the year that forced layoffs both here and at Pearson's operation near Chicago.

Now, based on much-higher order volume, Pearson says it's adding six to 10 jobs in manufacturing and another five to eight positions in engineering and sales.

"We are going into 2011 with a backlog of $15 million-plus in machine sales," says Michael A. Senske, Pearson's president and CEO. "The first and second quarter of 2011 should be at a similar pace. We are also hiring and will experience growth in 2011, compared to '09 and '10, and earnings should be solid and growing in 2011."

The company doesn't disclose exact sales figures but says overall revenue grew 7 percent last year, fueled by the fourth quarter, during which sales soared 126 percent higher than the year-earlier quarter.

The company currently employs 134 people, down from 147 in 2009, but that doesn't include the hiring it is doing now. Of that overall work force about 101 employees are located at Pearson's big headquarters and manufacturing plant at 8120 W. Sunset Highway, in the West Plains, and another 15 are located in its sales office in Vernon Hills, Ill., near Chicago, as well as 18 others throughout the U.S. and Mexico.

Pearson sells its equipment worldwide, to manufacturers of food, beverage, and personal-care products, including such companies as Kraft Foods Inc. and The Coca-Cola Co.

Senske credits the company's recent vitality to a relatively new focus on providing its customers with a complete line of what's called end-of-manufacturing-line packing-system equipment. Such systems erect cartons and boxes, pack and seal them, and then stack the boxes on pallets for distribution, sometimes using a collection of equipment. In the past, Pearson had mostly sold single pieces of equipment or some combinations of equipment.

"Because it's a complete end-of-line solution, customers don't have to get each machine from a different vendor," Senske says.

He says the company has transitioned in that direction over the past couple of years, and that the new path has included signing co-marketing agreements with other packaging equipment manufacturers as well as developing new technologies in-house.

"The machines all have a common look and feel with the same architecture," he says, adding that he believes Pearson is one of the only secondary packing-machine manufacturers that's now offering its own complete line of equipment.

Secondary packaging is the step after the individual items being sorted and boxed have been filled by the manufacturer, such as beverage bottles or bags of chips.

"That is driving a lot of growth for the company and has been our strategy all along," he says. "Yet, we can still be flexible with customers if they already have another (manufacturer's) machine, and we can integrate our equipment with other equipment."

Senske says the company weathered the recent economic recession well, even while some of its customers cut capital spending on new equipment.

He adds that Pearson mostly has maintained its employee headcount since 2008, and was also able to finance the acquisition of one of its competitors near the end of that year.

Its newest piece of equipment, introduced late last year, is called the MPI-300—MPI stands for multi-packing infeed, while 300 refers to the number of items it's able to process per minute. The machine, says Senske, is entirely new, but also is an extension of Pearson's current line of products.

Because it wasn't designed as a stand-alone machine, the MPI-300 will be sold and marketed as a component in Pearson's full line of packing equipment. Such equipment can cost in the hundreds of thousands of dollars.

A U.S. patent on the MPI-300's technology currently is pending. Senske says Pearson also plans to seek patents in 10 to 20 other countries, after which the new product will be available for sale internationally.

The MPI-300 organizes small, pre-wrapped items, such as candy or granola bars, coming off a conveyor belt from up to five vertically stacked "lanes." Once organized, a robotic arm picks up the items using vacuum suction and places them into a carton.

"It's more of a product-handling technology that allows us to handle individual items at much higher speeds, and packs them into cartons instead of cases," he says.

After the products are placed into a carton, from which the bars ultimately will be sold on a store shelf, such as near the checkout counter of a grocery store, the full cartons are sealed and placed into larger cases, which then are sealed and stacked.

"The beauty of the idea is that it leapfrogs existing technology and orients itself vertically instead of horizontally so it won't take up as much floor space," says Dusty McQuary, one of Pearson's lead engineers who helped design the MPI-300.

Senske adds that the new machine also is easy to maintain, with fewer working parts, and contends that users can change the type of product they want it to handle in much less time than it would take with a similar piece of packing machinery.

Pearson obtained the idea for the MPI-300 in late 2008, when it acquired Goodman Packaging Equipment, located just north of Chicago, in Vernon Hills, Ill., he says.

Jim Goodman, that company's former owner, had come up with a rough concept for the MPI-300, and after the acquisition worked with Pearson's engineers to create the actual machine, Senske says.

"He (Goodman) had a vision of how to handle products more quickly, so he worked with our design engineers, Mike Johnson and Dusty McQuary, to make the machine possible," he says. "They made certain changes along the way and adapted it to make sure it was commercially viable and complemented our existing technology."

As part of that transaction, Pearson also acquired Goodman's Chicago-area facility, Senske says, which Pearson retained as a sales and engineering office. The manufacturing and assembly operations formerly located there were moved to Pearson's 110,000-square-foot West Plains facility, he says.

Senske says the company doesn't have any new products scheduled to come out this year, and its main focus will continue to be maintaining, improving, and reducing the purchase cost of the current product line.

"I would say that we're doing well for two reasons," he says. "Being able to offer the end-of-line solution, and for our customers, being able to source the entire line from one company, which is attractive to them because it's more efficient and a better return on their investment."