Discover 14 Easy Ways to Improve Storage in your Warehouse – Part 1
The first 7 performance-boosting strategies you need to know
Is your warehouse performance running at its best? According to some studies, warehouse space often represents 15% to 20% of the cost per order. Many businesses can easily improve warehouse space use. This can reduce your storage costs, help make operations more efficient, eliminate the need for expensive expansions and help avoid having to find a new facility sooner than expected. In a two-part series, we look at 14 easy ways you can improve the use of your warehouse. Here are the first seven strategies.
1. Best use of your building
Analyse your building to determine how it can best be utilised from a space standpoint. Consider clear stacking height, column spacing, building impediments and overall process flow. Try to match vertical space needs with the building’s characteristics.
2. Operate with minimal inventory
Excess or obsolete inventory creates wasted warehouse space and ties up capital. It also creates clutter, and employees can lose time searching for product. It can even become a Health and Safety issue. Since the excess inventory is usually stored in the back of the warehouse, in the highest racking or in an offsite rented warehouse, most companies fail to address the problem on a regular basis. But holding excess or obsolete inventory is a cost and having a purge makes good business sense, even if you have to sell it at a discount.
3. Eliminate or reduce clutter
When you eliminate or reduce clutter, you will increase the accuracy of your warehouse operations and create a safer, less cluttered work environment for your staff.
4. Reduce travel time
The time your employees spend moving around your warehouse can cost you both billable hours and time. Research shows that as much as 70% of a warehouse picker’s workday can be spent walking, so it makes sense to streamline warehouse operations for your pickers by dividing inventory into categories. The grouping of similar inventory together (called ‘slotting’) reduces travel time and cuts down on opportunities for employee error. Slotting is a common practice in mid to large warehouses as it significantly improves operational efficiency. Plus, by considering the size and location of each individual order and planning trips accordingly, your employees can streamline multiple orders into a single trip.
5. Use your vertical space
Look up. What do you see? Are you using all the vertical space available? How many cubic metres of vertical space are you not using? By utilising vertical racking and shelving in your warehouse, you can expand in the most cost-effective way by using all of your existing warehouse space. Auckland Racking can help you take full advantage of your clear span height – just ask us how.
6. Analyse space use by department
Look for company functions or departments that do not require high ceilings. We often see unused overhead space where functions like packing and shipping are performed and they don’t need that overhead space.
7. Consolidate locations
If you have multiple locations for storing the same item, consider combining them to create more efficient use of warehouse space.
Strengthen your operational performance
By consistently evaluating your warehouse management processes and regularly reviewing internal data you can reduce operational costs and refine your warehouse processes to function at optimum efficiency. As a result, this efficiency will take pressure off your business operations while strengthening your operational performance. It’s a winning combination you shouldn’t overlook. If you’d like advice on improving your warehouse space, talk to us today.