Labor
Person-hours per shift, times shifts, times days the line runs, times the loaded wage, times the share of hours you expect to cut. Days are days per week times weeks per year.
Free tool for fruit and vegetable processing plants
Run the equipment numbers before the capex meeting.
Labor hours, yield points, kilowatts, and a simple payback for peelers, freezers, dehydrators, blanchers, washers, sorters, robotics, automation cells, and full lines. The defaults are rough on purpose. Edit them.
Your plant
These stay put when you switch equipment. Seasonal lines often run 30–40 weeks; year-round plants run closer to 50. Edit to match your calendar.
Choose a state to fill industrial averages for power, gas, and a production wage. Every figure stays editable.
lb
Annual throughput 4,800,000 lb. Operating days 240.
$/hr
%
Loaded wage $25.74 per hour.
$/lb
Price of the recovered pounds, not a premium and a yield gain for the same upgrade.
$/kWh
Typical industrial rate. Replace it with your local rate.
$/therm
Rough assumptions
Peeler
Mid-size vegetable peeler. Steam-leaning energy, a few points of peel loss recovered.
Whole crew on this step. Four people for 8 hours is 32.
%
%
Percent of input weight lost at this step today.
pts
Points of input weight you expect to sell instead of lose.
kWh
kWh per 1,000 lb of throughput.
kWh
86,400 kWh/year, about $7,344 .
therms
Therms per 1,000 lb. Use 0 if this step has no gas.
therms
21,600 therms/year, about $20,520 .
$
Optional. Leave blank to hide payback. Fold installation into this number if you want it counted.
Annual result
$220,043
Total annual savings, before capital.
- Payback
- 10 months
- Simple ROI
- 119%
- 5-year net
- $915,213
- Largest term
- Labor
| Labor saved6,144 hours | $158,147 |
|---|---|
| Yield gain144,000 lb | $79,200 |
| Energy deltaExtra operating cost | -$17,304 |
- Energy is a net new cost on these assumptions, so it reduces annual savings.
Sensitivity
| Measure | Conservative | Base | Aggressive |
|---|---|---|---|
| Payback | 1.8 years | 10 months | 7 months |
| 5-year net | $321,846 | $915,213 | $1,508,579 |
Sensitivity only — edit the main inputs for a full recalculation.
These figures are rough estimates for discussion, not a quote, bid, or engineering study. Defaults are industry-style assumptions and will not match your plant until you edit them. The model ignores maintenance, installation, freight, water, wastewater, depreciation, taxes, incentives, and the time value of money. Yield math treats improvement as extra saleable pounds of input weight, which is the wrong model for some drying and grading decisions. Confirm every assumption before a capex meeting.
Annual savings
$220,043
How the math works
Yield
Annual input pounds times the yield points you expect to recover, times product value. The points cannot exceed the loss you have today. A higher selling price belongs in product value, not in both places.
Energy and payback
The change in kilowatt-hours and therms, priced. If the new machine uses more, energy is a cost and it is subtracted. Payback is capital divided by annual savings. Five-year net is five years of savings minus capital, with no discount rate and no maintenance.
Equipment guides
Each page is the same calculator with a starting point and a short note on the mistake that page is easy to make.
PeelerMid-size vegetable peeler. Steam-leaning energy, a few points of peel loss recovered.WasherLabor is the main washer story. Water and wastewater are not priced in the model.BlancherA specified blancher often uses more steam than a casual tank. Labor savings stay small.Sorter / opticalInspection-belt labor, cut hard. Yield assumes you currently throw good product away.Freezer / IQFFluidized IQF planning load, about 0.17 kWh per pound. Labor savings are modest on purpose.DehydratorHot-air vegetable dryer. Yield means recovered saleable pounds, not water driven off.Robotics / AutomationLabor is usually the largest term. Yield and quality gains depend on the application. Energy is often modest compared with labor savings.Full lineA stack of soft assumptions. Use it to see which term dominates, then price the machines one by one.
Questions
Is this a quote?
No. PlantBench is an estimate for a capex conversation. The defaults are labeled assumptions, and the PDF says the same thing on both pages. It is not a bid, a design, or a guarantee.
What does yield improvement mean?
It is the percentage points of input weight you expect to sell instead of lose. The calculator caps that gain at your current loss, so you cannot recover pounds you were not losing. It is not water driven off in a dryer, and it is not a price premium. Price premiums belong in the product value field.
Why is energy sometimes a cost?
Peelers, freezers, dryers, and blanchers often use more power or gas than the step they replace. Energy is a delta. When the number is negative, the new machine costs more to run, and that cost is subtracted from labor and yield.
What is burden?
Burden is the cost of an hour beyond the wage: payroll tax, workers’ comp, and benefits. A 32% burden on a $19.50 wage is a loaded cost of $25.74. Use the loaded rate your accountant already uses.
Do you store my numbers?
The calculator runs in the browser and stores nothing while you edit. A name, email, company, and role are saved only when you download the PDF, along with the inputs and the results. The privacy page describes what that record is for.
Who built this?
Dan Ghadiri leads VegTech Systems and Bigtem USA. VegTech and Bigtem sell processing equipment, robotics, and automation. PlantBench is a free tool for fruit and vegetable processing plants from VegTech Systems, and it is independent of any single OEM. You can use the calculator without that conversation. The expert-review box is how you ask the VegTech team to look at your numbers.