Our Company
Automating the Food Industry Since 1979
We’re a Virginia-based OEM that creates finely tuned, custom equipment for the global food processing industry, occupying the end of production lines that sort and load food from ovens & freezers into packaging machines.
Since our humble beginnings in 1979, Drake rose to dominate this unique market, specifically by patenting a new, more efficient method of loading hot dogs and sausages. Drake has since remained an industry leader not only by keeping up with advances in technology, but also by innovating equipment for other products like chicken, cheese, pickles, snack sticks, and more.
The Right Hand of Food Production
Our success is anchored in our core values of doing the right thing, respect for our work, workers, and customers, accountability, knowledge through collaboration, and enthusiasm. When you work with Drake, you are working with a friendly group with decades of experience and a passion for problem solving.
By automating the food industry with sustainable, reliable, and innovative equipment, we bring the highest food safety, production output, parts and service response, and return on investment on the market. Our global agents, our Middleby family, and our in-house production company ensures we have the solutions to keep your production line moving forward.
What We Make
As an OEM of finely tuned, long-lasting, stainless steel food loaders, we take your products from the oven to the package. With many options available for how to sort, convey, index, and align your products, we help you package your food with a 98% fill rate. We have high sanitation standards that are USDA approved.
Why it’s the Best
Companies choose Drake because of our decades of experience. If you’ve had a hot dog in the last forty years, there’s a 90% chance that you’ve eaten something that came from a DrakeLoader. We’ve spent some time innovating through the pandemic, and we’ve taken our engineering expertise to new levels. We’ve also restructured our customer & technical support models, to create a system that more efficiently keeps things loading on the floor.
Our Dedicated Team
Our research, development, & manufacturing facility in Waynesboro, Virginia, featuring our engineers, machinist, sales, & admin teams.
What are Drake Loaders?
Align
We organize your food production. Food products come out of the ovens or freezers in bulk, and we sort them using state-of-the-art technology we’ve developed through our 40+ years of expertise. Your products are sorted and organized to hit the conveyor where they need to be.
Convey
Via belts, bucket chains, Sani-chain, and other flight options, we reliably send your organized product down the line towards the packager at high speeds. Our team will work with your requirements to find the best solution possible.
Autoload
With mechanical and robotic options, we index and load your products into your packager at different angles. Our robotic loading heads and end of arm tools pick and place & our mechanical options are formulated with our engineers to suit your needs.
Robotics
Beyond our robotic autoloader, we provide food-grade robotics for a variety of uses. With our patented end-of-arm tools and our expert engineers, we’re always looking for new projects. Our latest model is a rod-loader that takes heavy, product-laden rods from the oven and moves them to the next phase of production.
About Middleby Food Processing
Drake was acquired by the Middleby Corporation in 2011 & is now an integral part of their complete line solutions for the food processing industry. Equipped with the power of the Middleby brands, Drake’s reach in global manufacturing, collaborative engineering, and innovative leadership is second to none.
Combining Middleby’s broad portfolio of patented technologies and integrated systems with Drake’s experience, innovation, and reliability assure you have a complete line of best-in-class solutions for all of your food processing and packaging applications.
Patents & Certifications
Drake currently has more than 25 active US and international patents. The patents cover a wide range of sorting and loading innovations with an emphasis on production efficiencies and food safety. Included in our innovation portfolio are patented technologies for robotic loading that support the state of the art in food manufacturing techniques. Drake possesses the widest range of patented sorting and loading solutions that include collators, unscrambling belts, robotic and centrifugal sorters.
Even with our large offering of proven solutions, Drake continues to develop new technologies through a robust R&D program. We are always looking to improve sustainability, efficiency, and clean-ability of our products. Contact us for a full list of our patents.
