We have only a few competitors worth mentioning: Instron and the LFRA Texture Analyzer.

Instron is a fine company that makes an array of instrumentation that are perfect for testing products such as airplane landing gear, car frames, steel beams, plywood sheets and asphalt. They make instruments that speak to the soul of materials science engineers in the same way that IBM used to be the safe bet for anyone interested in computers. They historically made great kit for a certain engineering audience. Now they are a big firm that keeps growing more divisions as they swallow up more companies. Their business has expanded into many broad testing areas but a common theme among all divisions is that clients can measure their products with industry standard methods. Those industries that do not have common products or standards organizations are generally outside of the firm's field of view. They also have a huge service business. The last year Instron was public they had $30 million in service revenue, which was 16% of their total revenue. Its $10.5 million in service profit was almost equal to its $11.5 million corporate net income. Clearly their business model is built on service at a high ongoing cost to the customer. Since they need to focus on profitable service opportunities to support their service network it is hard to imagine them addressing your summer intern's really silly, but perhaps critical, sample handling questions.

Texture Technologies' only business is texture measurement with a narrow range of instruments, and TTC has established itself with a customer-service based business model that aligns its interests with those of its clients. SMS' has made such great instruments and software that our service revenue for supporting all of our instruments that have been in the field for almost 20 years is still under 0.5% of revenue. Our objectives are to treat every call as an opportunity to assist the customer, not bulk up the bottom line.

Our Chairman used to own the Voland Company which sold hundreds of LFRA Texture Analyzers in North America from 1971 through 1987. The instrument was known as the Voland-Stevens LFRA Texture Analyzer in North America. We have taken many of these "yellowbirds" in trade (and still occasionally do) since we started distributing the TA.XT2 family of instruments in 1987. We know both instruments extremely well and can identify the biases between them.

Texture Technologies is frequently asked why the LFRA tended to generate lower bloom values for gel than the TA.XT2. Among the reasons are that the LFRA 's display was only +/- 1 g increments and thus not as sensitive; the LFRA's trigger force was not easily user-calibrateable and drifted over time; and the trigger force had the same sensitivity as the display and thus could not as precisely trigger at the gel's surface. To calibrate away its drift the LFRA trigger required removing the hood over the mechanism and adjusting a set of analog pots on the main printed circuit board, and while the probe descended, selecting the exact point at which the probe sped up. It was tricky, required skill and judgment and we found that very few operators calibrated the trigger force well. The LFRA updated its display at only 6 times a second (often missing the real peak or the real final force), and the LFRA's top heavy design caused it to often vibrated when a user pressed the start button which also affected the triggering event. On soft gels, the differences are small and sometimes inconsequential. On firmer gels, the differences were substantial and frequently 15 to 20 bloom numbers.

The LFRA's production history is convoluted since it was concieved by the Leatherhead Food Resarch Association, designed by independent contractors, owned by Stevens, constructed by Mechtric (renamed Omitec), eventually sold to Farnell, and merged into CNS Farnell. In the US the instrument was sold by Voland Corp, then perhaps by Stevens, eventually by Michael Brown (not in this business anymore), then by CNS Farnell, and most recently by Brookfield (or its distributors), who purchased the business from CNS Farnell when they gave up on the LFRA Texture Analyzer and the QTS 25 Texture Analyzer. Historically it is hard to understand how the customers experienced consistent technical support or to whom they turned to for assistance. Brookfield is a great company that makes a full range of viscometers and is managed by excellent people. It remains to be seen where the little yellow LFRA imperical gel tester fits into their otherwise strong product mix and how it will be supported through the same distributor network that is well trained in fundamental viscosity measurements.

Perhaps an example of how other instrument companies may not offer the best help for food texture testing is the article "Using Instrumental Texture Analysis to Ensure Product Quality" written by Richard McManuis of Instron Corp in the Nov/Dec 2001 issue of Cereal Foods World. The consequences of the article may be food scientists conducting tests with poor results, and who may then wrongly conclude that texture analysis cannot help solve their problems. Follow this link to read the complete critique.