One of Scotland’s leading distilleries has invested in semi-automated storage to transform the capacity and operational efficiency of one of its finished goods warehouses by switching from block stacking to shuttle racking.
The investment increases storage capacity in the warehouse by over 75% and dramatically reduces operational costs, improves space utilisation, and reduces third party storage requirements.
The company had been using third party storage for a number of years and, like many, was looking at long term solutions to reduce costs and improve efficiency.
Working closely with Thistle Systems’ whisky storage specialists, the dedicated project team arrived at a solution that could store 3563 pallets in the same floor space – that’s an additional 1500 pallets.
However, the increased capacity is only part of the full range of benefits the semi-automated solution will bring to the warehouse.
Thistle Systems’ highly experienced designed team developed the solution to provide in excess of 400 pick faces to meet the expected number of SKUs.
This was achieved using a combination of depths of shuttle racking depending on stock levels with different blocks using First In First Out (FIFO) & First In Last Out (FILO) systems to provide the correct levels of stock and SKUs throughout the facility.
The semi-automated shuttles also dramatically reduce travel times and loading times and improve picking speeds by doing most of the work in the system. This will enable the current number of forklift trucks to increase the warehouse’s throughput significantly.
The shuttles automatic shuffling process, which pulls all stock forward, enabling additional stock in the FIFO system to be stored behind, dramatically improves space utilisation and virtually eliminate the need to move pallets continually.
The FILO shuttle racking block enables them to manage stock by date more effectively whilst improving the picking process during peak periods.