Most every manufacturing or distribution facility builds in storage and handling buffers – and for good reason. Buffers hold product or processes when work flow isn’t balanced. For instance, a conveyor buffer may exist between picking and packing operations. This allows picking to continue even if the packing, quality control or shipping departments are backed up. Buffers maintain balance between functions and ensure continuity.
Tags: Space Optimization, order fulfillment, ROI, conveyor design
Posted in Automation, Labor & Efficiency|
In our latest Shoptalk installment, employee-owner Amanda of our Systems Integration Group discusses how EDC upgraded and expanded its pick module operations.
Tags: warehousing, order fulfillment, Mezzanines, Order Picking & Fulfillment, ecommerce, Shoptalk
Posted in Order Picking & Fulfillment|
Above: flow storage installed on pallet rack beams in a distribution center
To increase warehouse productivity, reducing the time it takes for people to execute a task is always going to pay off. One way to do that is to concentrate on picking areas so that people are able to get what they need faster and more efficiently. A common gravity flow application is to mount shelves of flow storage on pallet rack so you can mix & match gravity flow and bulk pallet storage in the same structure for both existing and new rack systems.
Whether you’re adding flow storage to an existing rack system or building it from new, this guide should help you get started.
Tags: order fulfillment, picking
Posted in Pallet & Warehouse Racks|
The shift from traditional retail to e-commerce is accelerating, and with that growth there are both challenges and opportunities for order fulfillment operations. Companies that spent decades perfecting retail distribution (large, bulk orders to a network of stores) are shifting toward direct-to-consumer shipments that are orders of magnitude more difficult to manage.
Among other things, this means that e-commerce companies must focus on optimal packaging.
Tags: order fulfillment, Order Picking & Fulfillment, ecommerce
Posted in Conveyor Optimization|
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With the rising costs of workers’ compensation insurance and global pressures to increase productivity, warehouse and distribution center managers are taking a much closer look at improving ergonomics. With as many as 65% of worker’s compensation claims associated with manual materials handling, insurance companies are raising their rates—or mandating ergonomic improvements for continued coverage.
Equipment suppliers are responding to the need, engineering and designing features into their products to help workers minimize the strains associated with lifting, reaching, twisting, pulling and pushing. These new product features can also help address the demand for increased productivity as well.
Tags: plant safety, Order Picking & Fulfillment, Safety & Ergonomics, Material Handling, order fulfillment, warehouse safety, ergonomics
Posted in Safety & Ergonomics|
I received a newsletter the other day that really hit home during this busy Christmas season. It was about keeping warehouse order pickers motivated in their work and I thought, “That’s really key during peak seasons when highly stressed workers can get burned out quickly.” So, how do you keep order pickers moving when they’re already under the gun?
Tags: order fulfillment, worker safety, worker satisfaction, motivation, performance improvement, warehousing
Posted in Order Picking & Fulfillment|
The focus when it comes to order picking is usually (and justifiably) on the fastest-moving product. You slot your warehouse for fast movers. You pareto-focus on the 20% of the product that generates 80% of the business, as you should. But it’s also useful to consider the slow-moving inventory and pick locations. Simply putting the slowest movers in the least accessible area may make them consume more order picking time and storage space than necessary.
Tags: order fulfillment, Industrial Shelving, carton flow racks
Posted in Order Picking & Fulfillment|
Ever find yourself wondering how you can get more out of your pallet rack? Do you have goods that take up very little space, but your pick operations don’t call for entire pallets full of the product? Then you might need to look at ways to achieve more density in your storage, and we’ve recently found a gem of a product that can help you out. It’s called Dynamic High Density Storage and it’s made by SpeedCell.
Tags: Warehouse Management, warehousing, Pallet Rack, order fulfillment, warehouse storage, space savings, storage, industrial storage, distribution center, Order Picking & Fulfillment
Posted in Pallet & Warehouse Racks|
Studies indicate that order pickers spend too much time walking. Distribution center employees routinely spend more than  half their day walking, not picking orders, packing orders, or replenishing stock. They’re going from point to point, burning man hours getting where they need to be, not working. And that’s the average — for really poorly designed operations, it’s worse.
As they tire, workers pick slower, pick less accurately, and work more dangerously — almost a zombie like situation! Every bad thing that can happen in a warehouse operation is amplified, the more time employees spend walking.
Check out our most recent Info-graphic, “Walking is the Walking Death of Order Picking Productivity” for more information on ways you can combat this issue.
More information:
Tags: order fulfillment, lean warehousing, ergonomics
Posted in Order Picking & Fulfillment|
Retail distribution facilities have multiple options for shipping product to store locations. They can send full pallets which must be unwrapped, unloaded, and stocked at the store location. They can send packed carts that can easily be rolled onto store floors and stocked at the point of sale. What method works best?
Tags: Safety & Ergonomics, warehousing, order fulfillment, Retail distribution
Posted in Order Picking & Fulfillment|
