This is topic crumbly popcorn in forum Ground Level at Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE.
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Posted by Chad Souder (Member # 343) on 09-19-2000, 10:11 PM:
We've been having an ongoing problem with our popcorn getting broken up into small pieces. We have one big popper, and 5 popcorn warmers. On busy nights, we are forced to make several bags (trashbags full) ahead of time, just to keep up. The end result is that we end up discarding sometimes as much as half of a popcorn warmer because it all gets crushed, assumingly in the transportation. We've tried scoops with holes to allow the corn to sift through, but it actually seems to break it up more. Any ideas?
Posted by Lance C. McFetridge (Member # 95) on 09-20-2000, 06:21 PM:
What brand of corn are you using? Kind of sounds like a stupid question, but hybrid corn seed comes in varying qualities. Some is bred for tougher characteristics such as the corn used with carmel and the likes. While expansion rate plays a big part in our industry particularly. One thought is to check with your supplier, or you could contact Weaver. I am sure they could give you suggestions. http://www.popweaver.com/
Hope this helps
lance
Posted by Russ Kress (Member # 461) on 09-20-2000, 10:29 PM:
Use smaller bags to transport the product from the popper to the warmers.If you fill a standard 43" X 48" trash bag with popcorn, the shear weight of the corn will crush the product in the bottom of the bag.
Russ
Posted by Brad Miller (Member # 2) on 09-21-2000, 01:37 AM:
Some concessionists are extremely "rough" when scooping up the corn. These are also the people who like to constantly push the corn up against the back wall of the warmer. Every time they do that, they are crushing the corn and making more crumbs.I do agree, a big part of this is probably the raw corn itself, but...not "quite" filling up the raw corn container per batch will result in larger popped corn. 
Posted by Gracia L. Babbidge (Member # 582) on 09-21-2000, 02:36 AM:
What I have found is that plastic scoops tend to crush less popcorn than metal scoops. The over-sized ice-scoops work quite well, as long as it is not your only ice-scoop!Hey...before I was a projectionist, I shovelled more than my fair share of popcorn! 
~Gracia
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In some cultures, what I do is considered normal.
Posted by Chad Souder (Member # 343) on 09-22-2000, 08:01 AM:
We use Orville R. stuff, comes from Ohio or Iowa, and is the same stuff we've been using for quite awhile. So I'm confused. Do I want to fill the measuring cup all the way up, or not 'quite' and have bigger kernals. As I've thought in the past, I think also that our bags may be the problem. We use 60 gal. trash bags, simply because on busy nights we still need to make 6 or 7 of them. Maybe 12 or 13 smaller bags wouldn't be such a bad idea. Thanks so far.------------------
"Asleep at the switch? I wasn't asleep, I was drunk!" - Homer Simpson
Posted by Steve Scott (Member # 630) on 10-05-2000, 08:25 PM:
We use Great America seed, and I find that using a scoop and sifting lightly and rapidly over the sift holes works fairly well.Unfortunately, if you don't keep up on this, there's usually no hope for saving the entire bin.
Thank God we have several bins, chances are you'll get good popcorn in one of them!
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"Trying is the first step towards failure!"
-Homer Simpson
Posted by Chad Souder (Member # 343) on 10-07-2000, 09:56 AM:
As an update, we have began using smaller (33 gal) bags to store popcorn. AMAZING difference. I guess sheer weight was the main issue. So we go through more bags, but we save a heluvalot more corn.Oh, on a side note, I see we are gaining more and more Homer Simpson fans.
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"Asleep at the switch? I wasn't asleep, I was drunk!" - Homer Simpson