A glass and brittle plastic policy is a food maker's written rule for glass and hard plastic that could shatter into food. It has three parts. The policy: no glass or brittle plastic in production unless it's listed and needed, which means digital thermometers, not glass ones, covered lights, and no drinking glasses or personal mirrors. The register: every listed item, from light covers to scale displays to the window in the door, with where it is, how many there are, whether it hangs over exposed food, and a check on a schedule that counts them and looks for cracks. And the breakage procedure: stop the line, keep people out, discard exposed product within a set distance, clean with tools kept for it, inspect, record and sign off before restarting. Glass packaging, like bottles and jars, falls under the breakage procedure. The federal food rule asks for shatter-resistant bulbs, fixtures and other glass over exposed food, or other protection in case it breaks, and FDA treats a hard or sharp piece 7 to 25 mm in ready-to-eat food as adulterated. In the example below, a hot sauce maker logs a bottle broken at the capper. Below are the policy, the rules, the example, and a free register.
The short version
- No glass or brittle plastic in production unless it's on the register.
- The register lists each item, where, how many, over food or not, and protected or not.
- Check it on a schedule: count the pieces, look for cracks.
- Lights over exposed food: shatter-resistant or covered.
- Glass packaging: controlled by the breakage procedure.
- Breakage: stop, clear the area, discard exposed product nearby, clean, inspect, sign off.
- TaroStack keeps each run a lot and can hold it, so a breakage's bottles stay off orders. More below.
The policy
| Rule | What it means |
|---|---|
| Glass kept out | No glass thermometers, drinking glasses, glass jars of ingredients or personal mirrors in production |
| Listed and needed | Anything glass or brittle that has to be there goes on the register |
| Lights | Shatter-resistant bulbs or covers over exposed food |
| Checked | Each item counted and inspected, weekly over food, monthly elsewhere |
| Breakage | The procedure followed every time, and recorded |
| Packaging glass | Cases inspected at receiving; bottles and jars handled under the breakage procedure |
The breakage procedure
- Stop the line and say so out loud.
- Keep everyone back; don't walk through it.
- Discard open product within the set distance, often 10 feet, and anything with glass in reach of it.
- Sweep and vacuum with the breakage kit, kept apart and used for nothing else.
- Clean and inspect the equipment, especially fillers and cappers, where glass hides.
- Discard or clean the kit's brush and pan, and check shoes.
- A second person inspects and signs off before the line restarts.
- Record it: time, where, what broke, what was discarded, who cleaned, who signed off.
The rules
| Rule | Where |
|---|---|
| Glass over food | Shatter-resistant bulbs, fixtures, skylights or other glass over exposed food, or other protection against breakage (21 CFR 117.20(b)(5)) |
| Extraneous material | Adequate measures against metal or other extraneous material in food (21 CFR 117.80(c)(8)) |
| Hazard analysis | Glass among the physical hazards evaluated (117.130(b)(1)(iii)) |
| FDA's action line | Hard or sharp objects 7 to 25 mm long in ready-to-eat food adulterated (CPG Sec. 555.425) |
Glass is one source among many; the full list is in foreign material control program. This is general information, not legal advice.
An example: a Roanoke hot sauce maker
Blue Ridge Hot Sauce, the made-up hot sauce maker in Roanoke, Virginia, I use in these examples, fills 5-ounce glass bottles. Its register has eight lines: ten covered LED fixtures, the door window, an acrylic clock face, two scale displays, twelve color-coded bins and scoops, forty retained sample bottles in the office fridge, and the bottles in the packaging store. At the weekly check on October 12 a cracked scoop came out of use. Two days later, a bottle broke at the capper:
| Breakage log | |
|---|---|
| When | October 14, 10:20 |
| Where | Capper |
| What broke | One 5 oz bottle |
| Discarded | 36 open bottles within 10 feet, and the sauce in the filler bowl |
| Cleaned and inspected | Filler, capper and conveyor, by the line lead |
| Kit | Brush and pan discarded |
| Restarted | 11:05, signed off by the owner |
The breakage cost 45 minutes, a bowl of sauce, and 36 bottles worth about $74 at what a bottle costs to make, and the run's batch record carries a note of it. How the sauce's acidified food records fit around this is in FCE registration, and the self-audit an auditor's checklist follows in food safety audit checklist.
Get the template
Download the glass and brittle plastic register. Two sheets: the register, with each item's location, count, material, whether it's over exposed food and protected, how often it's checked, the last check, the count found and its condition, and the next check and a status, a missing piece, damage, an unprotected item over food or an overdue check in red; and a breakage log. It's an ordinary Excel file with no macros, and it works in Google Sheets, LibreOffice and Numbers.
Where this stops working
The breakage log says a bottle broke at 10:20. It doesn't keep the bottles filled in the minutes before it out of the next order, or tell you which store they'd have gone to.
How TaroStack does it
TaroStack keeps each run as a lot you can hold, so bottles from a doubtful stretch stay off orders until they're checked.
Each run a lot. Each filling run is a batch with its own lot and date, and your own fields on the batch record can note a breakage and the time.
Holds kept out of stock. Bottles in doubt can be put on hold, apart from what's available to sell, and released once they're inspected; what's thrown away goes off as an adjustment with its reason.
Where it went. Each order records the lots it got, so if a lot has to come back, one recall report shows every store that got it.
| The job | Binder | In TaroStack |
|---|---|---|
| Note a breakage on the run | A margin note | A field on the batch record |
| Keep doubtful bottles off orders | Tape on the case | A hold, kept out of stock |
| Bottles discarded | Not counted | An adjustment, with its reason |
| Which stores got a lot | Invoices | One recall report |
Batches, lots, holds, adjustments and recalls are on every plan, from $49 a month. The first 30 days are free, with no credit card. If you'd like a hand setting up, ask, and we'll do it with you.