Customer

Beyond bags and boxes - during the past 100 years, Schwarz has transformed the process of supplying packaging materials and printed products into a dynamic business that expands across all aspects of a customer’s supply chain; from procurement, warehousing, e-commerce, to fulfillment, logistics, reporting, budgeting and value-add services. With facilities across the country and overseas, Schwarz continues to be a leader in its marketplace.

Location

Schwarz supports its customer with over a dozen locations. Three Regional Distribution Centers located in the Northeast, Midwest and West Coast have a combined storage capacity of over 1.6 million sq. ft. – and over 215 doors for inbound and outbound shipments. These key facilities support 30,000 Quick Service Restaurants, 40,000 Retailers, 7,000 Packaging Stores and more.

Challenge

Schwarz process was to pre-print the in-bound paper work for all shipments arriving at their receiving docks. This included pallet labels that would identify the item and its storage location. Typically, a shipment would consist of multiple pallets of various items and the receiving clerk would have a stack of labels to apply to the various pallets.

According to George Guzman, Director of Distribution Technology, “We often ended up with the wrong amount of labels - either too many or too few. If we ended up with too many, we were concerned that we did not receive the order complete. If we ended up with too few, we were concerned the clerk put the wrong label on the wrong item. Even when we had the right quantity of labels, we were concerned that the correct label was being applied to the correct pallet.”

Solution

Schwarz decided they wanted to print the labels “on-demand” where and when they needed them. “We tried a portable, battery-operated belt printer, but the volume of labels needed quickly determined that a faster, larger volume printer was required - yet it still needed to be mobile. We chose the Zebra Z4M barcode printer, but it needed a mobile power source.”

After careful consideration, Schwarz selected the NB Series Shelf Label Printing System. Deciding factors included economical price, battery life, ergonomics, ruggedness, product availability and overall design.

“I had some experience with powered carts used in healthcare. Most were either too small because they were designed for laptop computers or too large because they would be holding PCs with flat panel monitors, baskets, mouse pad holders and such. The NB Series cart was just the right fit for our needs - a "no nonsense" piece of equipment.”
 

Result

“The NB Series design allows us to have a Zebra barcode printer, the label storage, a bar code scanner and desktop work area all in one portable workstation. This workstation can be moved to the exact location where the work needs to be done. We have eliminated the travel times of employees returning to the office for missing labels.”

“We are much more confident that the correct label is being placed on the correct pallet and item, since we are only printing the specific label needed where and when we need them - therefore we have improved inventory accuracy. We have increased the warehouse associate's productivity because the labels print quickly and are readily available on the receiving docks next to the unloaded/staged pallets.”

“Whether the task is receiving and labeling in-bound pallets on the receiving docks or going up and down each aisle in the warehouse to locate and re-label stock, shelves, or racking, the NB Series has proven to be a reliable, mobile piece of equipment. We have come to rely on the NB Series powered cart the same way we rely on our forklifts and pallet jacks.”

George Guzman, Director of Distribution Technology.