Planning, preparation help warehouse1 work from square 1.
My favorite sale showed me that sometimes, the best solutions require starting from scratch. It allowed me to create a more efficient solution from the ground up for our client, a St. Louis-are distributor of automotive fluids, who sought a more orderly solution for their nearly 700,000 sq. ft. warehouse.
The racks were from a variety of suppliers and did not effectively utilize the space. The customer needed a more efficient solution and contacted us at warehouse1 (Kansas City, MO). Despite the challenge it presented due to scale, the job went surprisingly smoothly.
I began the job by examining all the existing rack, doing a bay-by-bay count and mapping out the entire warehouse, a job which I completed over the course of three day-long visits. We have an extensive used-rack business at warehouse1, so we bought all of the old product from the customer and removed it from the site. I was then able to do the proposed design in AutoCAD.
The new design utilized Monarch teardrop selective roll-form racks that better fit the customer’s needs regarding aisle sizes, height utilization and cube height. The standardization proved to be a much cleaner solution than the previous collection of mismatched racks. We went in and revamped their whole warehouse and made it a lot cleaner and more efficient. The installation was completed in two phases over the course of approximately six months.
While the project was a success for the customer and warehouse1, it provided me with valuable insight for future installations- mainly, be prepared. Have things lined out ahead of time so there are no surprises when it’s time to start. I took a lot of satisfaction away from the job because the end product ended up helping out the customer significantly.
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Meet the Author Scott Harleman, 34, is a sales representative for warehouse1 (Kansas City, MO). He is an 8-year veteran of the material handling industry. |