Most Recent Articles

Deep dive into the ways that powered carts can make distribution centers more efficient, reducing the footsteps, the footprint in the workspace, and the cycle times, as well as issues related to mislabeling and excess payroll spend.

One of the most common questions we hear in our industry - and discuss among our own teams – is “how far will automation go and WHEN?” As a manufacturer working to improve productivity for our customers, it is a question that has implications for every part of our business – not just in planning the products we want to develop and market, but those we will need to use in our production process.

Since 2020 has us rethinking EVERYTHING we were doing before, we wanted to make a quick share for you to start the week with a visual look at some basic Warehouse Design fundamentals. The events of the last few months have everyone wondering what the warehouse of the future will look like. But while doing updates to your CURRENT space to react to the new normal, how closely have you been adhering to the basics already?

We thought this infographic was a good representation of some of those basic pillars of good warehouse design. Let's start with the basics we use for planning. The one thing we'll highlight here is how often we hear that space management is the BIGGEST issue our client's are having. If you are exceeding the guidance below and using over 30% of your square footage for storage, it means you might be feeling crowded. Better rack utilization and building up may improve your sense of space!

Unless your facility is consistently recognized as a bleeding edge innovator and always staying two steps ahead of the rest of your industry, you’re probably like the rest of us and are hungry to know more about how your facility performs or compares to your competitors or others in your industry.

The digital revolution that is transforming the broader economy continues to shape distribution models as well. Increasingly business distribution centers are evolving to serve customers directly in addition to their more traditional roles as distributors for retailers and resellers.

Larger businesses are leading the charge to transform their own warehouses into world-class distribution centers. However, smaller businesses find it difficult to match their efficiency and speed with similar facility and systems investments. This disparity begs the question, “How can smaller companies keep up?” The best way to stay relevant is to outsource these non-core functions to better qualified partners instead of trying to match what large companies are doing.

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While many companies are just catching their breath from recent holiday shipments, this New England DC is in the midst of ramping up for its annual busy season - Spring Golf!

With inventories bulging from summer shipments coming in for the holidays, Distribution Centers everywhere are gearing up for the peak retail season. Historically the last four months of the year generate about 60% of a typical retailers’ annual sales, which also means this is the season where many businesses earn their real profit for the year. But how do you make sure all that inventory get out the door as planned and you are not stuck with overstock at the end of the year?

Despite low unemployment and a long-term economic growth streak with record profits now approaching a full decade, distribution centers and warehouses have continued to experience trouble retaining skilled or experienced staff. The problem lies more in how management values the contribution of their people in those facilities – which also makes it somewhat easier to resolve. Today we look into the problem with the help of some great research from ProLogistix through the WERC organization.

The annual DC Metrics study has been published and while the entirety of the report is worth studying as an excellent source of industry benchmarks and trends, we wanted to share and dive into a few of the highlights that jumped out at us as significant this year.

The Real Meaning of “Future” - One thing that everyone hates to admit about “future articles” is that the reality of what they talk about is already here. The rest of us are behind the curve trying to catch up!  While we are assigning these innovations to the “future” - perhaps to give us more time to budget for them – it certainly doesn’t hurt to invest our time into learning our options and planning ahead for the opportunity to take the leap with something new.