Free Webinar! 3PL Effective Collaboration

Free Webinar! 3PL Effective Collaboration

Alpine Managing Principal, Michael Wohlwend, teamed up with Kevin Coleman of DSC Logistics, and Charlie Piper of Saddle Creek Logistics to discuss lessons that you can leverage for your successful third-party logistics partnerships during the October 10th Warehouse Education Research Council (WERC) webinar. Whether public warehouse or contract logistics, use these tactics for more effective 3PL collaboration!
Click below to watch the webinar now.

About DSC Logistics:

When Dry Storage Corporation was founded in 1960, we provided our customers space to store their products and a promise to meet their changing needs by, in the words of our founder, Jim McIlrath, “doing a better job tomorrow than we did today.” Ann McIlrath Drake, Jim’s daughter, joined in 1994 as CEO, and her vision unified our organization from a public warehousing company of 22 acquired affiliates to “one great company: DSC Logistics.” Under Ann’s leadership, we established our strong reputation for strategic collaboration, providing integrated supply chain solutions to many of the world’s leading companies.

 

About Saddle Creek Logistics:

Saddle Creek is an asset-based third-party logistics provider based in Lakeland, Florida. We specialize in designing and delivering omnichannel logistics solutions for manufacturers, retailers and ecommerce companies.Our approach is solution based and data driven, using the most advanced operational methods and sophisticated technologies.

Get Smart with Upgraded Conveyor Design!

Get Smart with Upgraded Conveyor Design!

Are you curious about upgrading your warehouse through new conveyor simulation systems to improve throughput? Read Alpine Supply Chain’s input on the shifting “digital twin” technology and get smart with your own dynamic conveyor design.

“As warehouses and distribution centers continue to go high-tech, the tools used to design them are following suit with advances that make it easier for companies to predict how their operation will evolve to meet changing business demands over time. Conveyor simulation technology offers a case in point, shifting from a tool that simply shows how a conveyor system will work into one that can help companies plan the best system to meet peak service demands, ever-later order-cutoff times, and the staffing requirements to handle such changes. The software programs used to simulate conveyor system design today use advanced algorithms and data analytics to produce those results, and experts say the added use of sensors and Internet of Things technology is evolving to help produce real-time replicas of physical systems (think “digital twin” technology) that can provide organizations with even more productivity-enhancing data.

‘Today, a customer can expect to see a lot more [from conveyor simulation] than just ‘does the system work?’ explains Luther Webb, vice president, data science at material handling solutions provider Trew LLC. “[We have] more advanced modeling written in advanced code form. Today, [in a simulated design] the customer is looking at various formulas built into a model, and those formulas are interacting with each other.’

The end result is a dynamic model of conveyor technology that is helping organizations maximize throughput and minimize labor costs.”

A Healthy Start: How School Health Corp. Designed Its New Warehouse with Alpine Supply Chain

A Healthy Start: How School Health Corp. Designed Its New Warehouse with Alpine Supply Chain

Founded in 1957, School Health Corporation is a leading national provider of supplies and services to health professionals in educational settings from pre-school to college. The company offers more than 20,000 products ranging from health supplies, sports medicine equipment and early childhood products to physical education, recreation and special needs aids.

The Challenge: Maximizing the Layout of a New Warehouse

With School Health’s success and growth, the company recognized that it had outgrown its primary warehouse facility. It committed to build a new, larger facility in suburban Chicago.

“While we are adept at warehouse operations and order fulfillment, our current team had never designed a warehouse from scratch before,” said Beth Reed, School Health’s project manager/training developer.

How should the company slot its product inventory for maximum efficiency and throughput? How best to handle seasonal spikes in demand for certain products that typically occur at the start of each new school year? How should it number and label its bins for optimal performance with its existing warehouse management software?

“It takes more than educated guesswork and spreadsheets to properly slot product inventory,” Reed said. “We wanted to do things right from the start, so we soon recognized that we needed to bring in outside expertise.”

The Solution: Engaging Experts in Inventory Slotting and Labeling

School Health worked with Alpine SupplyChain Solutions to help with warehouse location methodology and slotting plans. The project’s goals included minimizing the time and distance required to replenish key products; reducing workers’ bend-and-reach requirements for placing and picking products; and more efficiently organizing its inventory for greater throughput.

“The Alpine team asked great questions to understand our needs,” Reed said, “and they have access to cutting-edge tools that were fundamental to the project’s success.”

Alpine is a strategic partner with Optricity, a provider of software solutions for warehousing optimization. Its OptiSlot DC™ tool was used to analyze a variety of School Health’s unique factors, including product dimensions, weight and velocity, pick paths, material handling equipment like their conveyor system, pallet building, inventory seasonality requirements and more.

“In my role, I hadn’t previously spent a lot of time thinking about warehouse location address methodology,” Reed noted. “But working with Alpine made the entire project team appreciate the science involved in slotting our products. An optimally slotted warehouse supports efficiency and profitability. Just as important, it also minimizes the time and effort involved in key tasks like product putaway, or picking and order fulfillment, which our employees appreciate.”

Smart Labeling for a Smart Warehouse

At the same time School Health engaged Alpine SupplyChain Solutions, it also reached out to ID Label.

“Since we were investing in doing things right in our new warehouse we decided we should upgrade from in-house rack labels that wouldn’t perform to the requirements of our new environment,” Reed said.

After seeing an ad, School Health requested sample labels and product information. Due to the seasonal velocity of some of their products, the team knew they needed flexibility in how rack slots were labeled. Magnet-backed labels were an option, but they can occasionally be knocked to the ground from daily encounters with forklifts and other traffic.

“ID Label did a site visit and showed us their removable label, Clean Release™. We immediately knew it was the perfect solution for our flexibility needs,” Reed said.

Clean Release features an innovative adhesive that makes these labels fully removable and repositionable without any scraping or leftover residue, yet they can remain fully in place for years at a time.

“Now we can easily adjust and move our location labels to match our slotting strategy,” Reed said. “As an added bonus, ID Label was able to match our corporate color, so our rack labels are a colorful extension of our corporate brand!”

Optricity and ID Label Collaboration

Additionally, Optricity and ID Label have teamed to ensure that the design and barcode symbology used in ID Label’s custom-manufactured labels complement Optricity’s data logic and slotting algorithms for maximum operational efficiency and scanning accuracy.

Advice for Others

When asked what advice she might offer to industry colleagues facing a similar project, Reed recommended the following:

-Start your planning early. You will need more time than you think.

-Be inclusive and engage key personnel to tap your company’s internal knowledge.

-Engage knowledgeable consultants and vendors. Leverage their expertise to fast-track large projects.

-Track, measure and manage. Build a timeline and document your milestones. Know that issues and obstacles will arise along the way.

-Run a dress rehearsal (or three!) before going live.

​”Finding the right experts to work with was definitely a key to the success of this important project,” Reed concluded.

#SupplyChainSolutions

“True Story: WMS Selection in 90 Days and Go-Live in Five Months, and Under Budget”

“True Story: WMS Selection in 90 Days and Go-Live in Five Months, and Under Budget”

This week I gave a presentation at the Warehouse Education Research Council (WERC) Conference, with Bob Moran, President of First Logistics, “True Story: WMS Selection in 90 Days and Go-Live in Five Months, and Under Budget.”

If you weren’t able to see the presentation in person, I’m happy to send it to you as an example of the selection and implementation process you can expect when you work with us. Just send me a message in the blue “Contact Us” form below.

We’re happy to help with any of your supply chain projects, including strategic planning, system integrations, distribution network analysis, transportation optimization and lean training for warehouse and VAS.

Let us know how we can help.

#WMS #WERC #SupplyChainSolutions


More About Bob Moran:

Bob joined First Logistics as a partner in April 2015. His experience as an entrepreneur and corporate CEO make him the ideal company President.  Thirty plus years in the logistics industry give him unique qualifications to lead our company’s strategic growth initiatives.

As a recognized industry leader, Bob has earned the International Warehouse and Logistics Association (IWLA) professional designation of CWLP (Certified Warehouse Logistics Professional). Bob has also been teaching warehousing courses within the industry since 1992.  Recognized by the IWLA as the recipient of the 2009 Distinguished Service and Leadership Award, Bob’s commitment to the industry is absolute.

Weak Leaders are on the Rise!

Weak Leaders are on the Rise!

You may ask yourself why would weak warehouse leaders be on the rise?

It’s not that Strong Warehouse Leaders are not great leaders, however weak leaders are open to a different expectations.

Think about this, People love Jokes. With a joke there is a expectation and a response. Regardless if the Joke is a good or bad joke, there is the element of surprise and a response. Now let’s take that same concept to a Warehouse. With a warehouse there are expectations and responses.

Receive, Store, Pick, and Ship

On a daily basis we receive products and ship products.

In some warehouses these quantities on a daily basis may be a surprise and some maybe scared about the fluctuating volumes.

It’s those leaders that are open to new expectations and responses. Where a Strong Leader is expected to have all the answers, however with the amount of data now available, Weak leaders will take the data and look at new ways. This is why we are seeing a shift to “Weak” leaders. Typically Strong leaders already have the answer.

Don’t be afraid and follow the new ideas. This can seem to be a daunting task, but remember to rely on the power of the data and people.