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Seeing Around Corners: The Danger Spots in Warehouses & Factories

August 28, 2012
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pallet rack row end and forklift traffic

In an industrial environment, intersections can be dangerous. With fast-moving workers who are busy and probably distracted, and fast-moving forklifts that may have loads elevated that can obstruct the driver’s view, corners, ends of rack rows, and intersections can be the cause of many accidents. Whether it’s a worker walking and carrying a load, or a forklift on its way to the next pick, the chances of collisions, injuries, and damages are greater at intersections than most anywhere else. What are your options when it comes to making your intersections safer?

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Posted in Forklift - Pedestrian Safety|

Protecting Order Pickers in Rack Aisles

June 22, 2012
by

worker in safety vest and hard hat standing in pallet rack aisle

“We need help before someone gets hurt”

The situation is familiar: in a busy warehouse or distribution center, you can have dozens or hundreds of order pickers that walk the floor with carts and clipboards or scan guns to pick orders for shipping. These are usually focused people who have the job in mind. After all, you’ve probably told them how speed is of the essence – which it is. The problem is that in many or most operations, there are also forklifts, walkies, or electric powered jacks operating in the same space, often in tightly spaced pallet rack aisles.

And guess what? The guys driving those forklifts are busy and focused on the job, too. It’s almost assured that if you have this situation, you’ve had accidents, or near-accidents — which you may never hear of, until the near-miss isn’t a miss at all.

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Posted in Safety & Ergonomics|

To-Do List for Moving a Warehouse

February 7, 2012
by

warehouse reconfiguration

Over the past four decades, we’ve seen plenty of operations move. We’ve installed entirely new conveyor systems into functioning operations without disturbing the flow of existing work. We’ve seen companies pick up an entire distribution operation and move it across two hundred feet of parking lot into another building. It’s not new territory for us, and if you have managed a manufacturing or warehousing operation long, it’s probably not for you either.

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Posted in Warehousing & Distribution|

Ten Reasons to Automate Your Operation

June 10, 2011
by

automated conveyors

In the not-too-distant past, most companies that weren’t running immense distribution operations, who didn’t have multiple facilities, who didn’t run 24-hour shifts, didn’t even consider automation. Too expensive, they’d say. Too much risk. Too little upside if things go wrong.  All valid in context, if it was 1998. But the reality is this: While most costs—personnel, land, energy— have increased, automation costs have remained steady or declined across the board. The reality today is that the four guys stacking pallets at the end of a line, even for a single shift, even at low wages, are more expensive than a well configured palletizing system.

Those costs aren’t going to do anything but escalate, either. Listed are ten ways automation has become more relevant, even to mid-size operations:

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Posted in Automation, Labor & Efficiency|

Smart Labor Management Helps Cut Warehouse Costs

May 22, 2011
by

packing operations

It’s important to control costs in your operation. What are some warehousing cost-cutting methods you can employ that don’t require extensive investment or re-tooling? Most of the costs of warehousing operations fall into the following categories:

  • People
  • Real Estate, Utilities & other Fixed Costs
  • Inventory
  • Technology

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Posted in Warehousing & Distribution|

13 Best Practices for Warehouse Productivity

March 17, 2011
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Improving a warehousing operation is a complex endeavor that can be approached from any number of angles. Here are 13 common actions you can consider in any warehouse improvement effort:

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Posted in Warehousing & Distribution|

Why Warehouse Employees Ignore Safe Lifting Advice – and How to Help Them

December 5, 2010
by

lifting boxes and cartons correctly

The most common advice that ergonomics experts, OSHA, and other researchers provide to people in warehousing or other jobs that require manual lifting is that you should always bend your knees and lift that way, rather than bend at the waist to pick something up. Repetitive stress on the lower back is staggering: 20% of workplace injuries are related to lower back issues. Lifting right is essential to employee safety, and also to preventing Worker Compensation claims.

Even when you train employees to lift right – and we know that not everyone does – they frequently ignore the advice. Why?

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Posted in Safety & Ergonomics|

Forklift Safety: Don’t Blame the Driver

June 24, 2010
by

Forklift driver as seen from overhead in a warehouse. Forklift is in motion.

Most forklift accidents are blamed on operator error, but that is just partially true – and something of a cop-out. Rough estimates say that a quarter of forklift accidents could be avoided by addressing environmental concerns. When you eliminate those, it helps you understand better when a driver is truly ineffective, or just hamstrung by the way your warehouse is set up. In other words, before you point the finger at the driver, take a look at your operation. Read the rest of this entry »

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Posted in Forklift - Pedestrian Safety|

Get Your Pushback Rack Load Right

October 12, 2009
by

Pushback racks

Push back rack systems are excellent high density storage solutions — perhaps the most economical way to squeeze space out of a crowded warehouse.  All loads are stored and retrieved from the same aisle. This reduces the number of aisles needed in a facility, freeing up more space for storage. Aisles can take a great deal of space up in a typical warehouse, so by implementing a pushback pallet rack system, you essentially swap selectivity for space. Push back rack systems provide a Last-In-First-Out (LIFO) inventory rotation, so you have to be certain your load fits. If it does, congratulations — you’ve just saved a lot of space.

But there are issues that can arise when pushback rack is inappropriately specified or utilized.

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Posted in Pallet & Warehouse Racks|

Comparing Gravity Flow Rack Types

June 15, 2008
by

Carton flow rack system for order picking

Walk into any order fulfillment operation, and you will see gravity flow rack.

The reason is obvious–it’s one of the best ways to pick orders utilizing first-in, first-out principles. It used to be that there was one kind of the stuff, the plastic-wheel tracks, but these days the choices are more diverse than ever. For the most part, these flow rack types act the same; they decline toward the picker and boxes or totes or even larger components flow toward him. They’re restocked from the rear and picked from the front onto a takeaway conveyor line, a cart, workstation, or another step in the process.

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Posted in Order Picking & Fulfillment|

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