Warehouse operations are at the heart of each company. Everything must run smoothly for orders to go through without a hitch and an efficient warehouse keeps costs low and customer satisfaction high. Here are some ways you can maximise your warehouse efficiency.

Optimise all available space 

When you make the most of your warehouse space, you allow more room for additional stock and an easier way of finding it. Consider making better use of your vertical space – add in shelves and use up the wall space where possible.  

Consider a variety of shelving to support the materials you have. You’ll want something strong and durable for heavier items of stock. Make sure it’s easily accessible for your staff to reach and utilise. 

Inventory management 

Internal warehouse processes must be as efficient as possible to allow orders to go out on time and to keep stock levels accurately managed. Having timely order fulfilment will lead to more satisfied customers and a constant stream of orders coming in. That’s why you should definitely consider researching interesting warehouse organization ideas, as you might get inspiration for improving the efficiency of your storage.

Try using warehouse management software that can give you an overview of your inventory levels and alert you when certain items of stock are low and close to running out so that you can get them ordered back in.  

Consider temporary solutions 

If you find that you have more stock to house during busier months, such as Christmas and during sales periods, but you are struggling to find space for them you could consider using a temporary warehouse for storage.

This will allow you to still manage your current warehouse successfully and reduce the risk of it becoming overcrowded which can minimise the efficiency of your picking and packing process.  

Ensure floors are clear 

Having clear floors with plenty of walk space and no clutter will make your pick and pack staff’s lives so much easier and speed up the process as much as possible. Make sure that all stock is stored away on a shelf or in its own designated area away from walkways and that no other items such as chairs, ladders, or staff belongings are strewn across the warehouse as these can also pose a risk as a trip hazard. 

Encourage staff to keep their belongings in a separate staff room and have their lunch elsewhere than on the warehouse floor as this can clog up space, especially if you have an influx of orders come in and you need them out as quickly as possible.  

Hernaldo Turrillo

Hernaldo Turrillo is a writer and author specialised in innovation, AI, DLT, SMEs, trading, investing and new trends in technology and business. He has been working for ztudium group since 2017. He is the editor of openbusinesscouncil.org, tradersdna.com, hedgethink.com, and writes regularly for intelligenthq.com, socialmediacouncil.eu. Hernaldo was born in Spain and finally settled in London, United Kingdom, after a few years of personal growth. Hernaldo finished his Journalism bachelor degree in the University of Seville, Spain, and began working as reporter in the newspaper, Europa Sur, writing about Politics and Society. He also worked as community manager and marketing advisor in Los Barrios, Spain. Innovation, technology, politics and economy are his main interests, with special focus on new trends and ethical projects. He enjoys finding himself getting lost in words, explaining what he understands from the world and helping others. Besides a journalist, he is also a thinker and proactive in digital transformation strategies. Knowledge and ideas have no limits.

The post How To Optimise Your Warehouse To Get The Most Out Of It appeared first on OpenBusinessCouncil Directory.

There are so many different things that go into running a business that it can be genuinely overwhelming a lot of the time. In fact, a lot of people find that they end up neglecting entire areas of their business that are incredibly important. The truth is that all businesses are different which means the areas of importance in any given business are going to depend on a lot of factors. However, there are some things that end up getting ignored far more often that others. In the modern world, it’s incredibly common for a lot of businesses to require warehouses for everything from manufacturing to fulfillment to shipping. And yet, it’s still an area of a lot of businesses that often ends up getting ignored, or at the very least doesn’t get the attention that it needs. With that in mind, here are some things that you can do in order to make sure that your warehouse is always running smoothly.

Connect with the right people

One of the most important things about creating any successful and efficient warehouse is that you have to be working with the right people. This applies to both employees and outsourcing work. When you’re recruiting people for your warehouse, you need to be sure that they are people you can rely on to be efficient and safe. When outsourcing, whether it’s inventory management or pallet delivery, you need to be sure that you’re working with companies that you can trust. If your warehouse is in the wrong hands, it can cause serious problems.

Create a safe environment

Safety is an important factor in any workplace but it’s more important in a warehouse than just about anywhere else. Working in a warehouse will involve spending a lot of time in close proximity to heavy machinery and if something goes wrong, the results can be truly catastrophic. And if something happens to someone working in your warehouse because you haven’t taken all of the necessary safety precautions, you’re the one who’s going to be liable for it.

Embrace innovation

Innovation is an essential part of any business and your warehouse is no exception. Things like inventory management are made a whole lot easier through the use of modern technology. Not just that but even simple things like managing when employees are working and keeping your equipment up to standard is made so much easier through modern technological innovations. A lot of the work you do might be much the same as it has always been, but that doesn’t mean that there isn’t still value in embracing innovation within your warehouse wherever possible.

The truth is that you should think of your warehouse in the same way that you think of a lot of different parts of your business: a smaller cog that makes up the much larger whole. If you let certain areas of your business fall by the wayside, then you run a very serious risk of the whole thing collapsing at once.

This is an article provided by our partners network. It might not necessarily reflect the views or opinions of our editorial team and management.

Contributed content

Hernaldo Turrillo

Hernaldo Turrillo is a writer and author specialised in innovation, AI, DLT, SMEs, trading, investing and new trends in technology and business. He has been working for ztudium group since 2017. He is the editor of openbusinesscouncil.org, tradersdna.com, hedgethink.com, and writes regularly for intelligenthq.com, socialmediacouncil.eu. Hernaldo was born in Spain and finally settled in London, United Kingdom, after a few years of personal growth. Hernaldo finished his Journalism bachelor degree in the University of Seville, Spain, and began working as reporter in the newspaper, Europa Sur, writing about Politics and Society. He also worked as community manager and marketing advisor in Los Barrios, Spain. Innovation, technology, politics and economy are his main interests, with special focus on new trends and ethical projects. He enjoys finding himself getting lost in words, explaining what he understands from the world and helping others. Besides a journalist, he is also a thinker and proactive in digital transformation strategies. Knowledge and ideas have no limits.

The post Is Your Warehouse Running Smoothly? appeared first on OpenBusinessCouncil Directory.

When running a retail, manufacturing, supply, or fulfilment business, the warehouse is crucial to your success. The more cost-effectively and quickly you can store, manage, and move products, the more profit that’s yours to make. However, warehouses are full of the potential for inefficiency. For that reason, we’re going to look at how you cut the downtime, cut the costs, and cut the wasted energies to make sure your warehouse is the most efficient beast it can be.

Measure it

Before you can even answer how you make your warehouse more efficient, you need to know how efficient it is already. Thankfully, warehouses are easy to measure when you put your mind to it. There are plenty of software suites that can track major key performance indicators for warehouse success, including receiving efficiency, picking accuracy, carrying cost of inventory, inventory turnaround, and the like. With these key performance metrics, you can see where your greatest inefficiencies are. Are you spending too much on storing and transporting products? Does it take too long for products to get posted? Are they kept in place too long, clogging up the system and making it hard to find a place for new inventory? The tips we explore now are going to help you address some of those problems.

Track your products (and equipment)

Nowadays it’s easier than ever to completely track all the inventory in the warehouse. You can see when something arrives, how long it remains in storage, and when it’s finally shipped off. This has a whole series of benefits. First of all, by tracking where both products and equipment are with management software like Vero, it’s much easier to identify and find the inventory that you need at any one point. Furthermore, knowing where it is reduces the chances of loss by having inventory that goes unseen until it’s no longer able to be moved on and sold or used.

Clean navigation is crucial

With the right tracking solutions, your team should know how to find the things they need, but how easy is it for them to reach and find them? Warehouse navigation needs to be orderly, offering the most direct path to inventory as possible. It means it takes a lot less time to get from point A to point B, meaning your intake, output, and moving processes will go quicker, allowing your workers to get more done each day. Besides slowing your staff down, inefficient warehouse layouts are a lot more likely to lead to potential accidents, which are disastrous not just for efficiency, but also for employee navigation. Beyond layout, make sure that lighting is as effective as possible and that individual sections, from walkways to storage bays to equipment storage, are clearly marked. Keeping floor maps with different sections noted can help all employees quickly get where they need to go, too.

Fuelling your savings

Cost efficiency is just as important as time efficiency. First of all, there’s the cost of maintaining inventory, such as cooling and air conditioning. Ensuring your equipment is regularly serviced and as efficient as possible can reduce your costs in the long-term, even if it costs more in the short term. For warehouse equipment, such as forklifts, using more energy efficient fuels can help you get more out of every gallon if you switch from traditional fuels like petrol to better burning alternatives, such as Supagas LPG. There are plenty more ways to make warehouses more energy efficient, such as implementing LED light bulbs instead of the traditional kind, too.

The most dangerous source of downtime

As mentioned, accidents and injuries on the warehouse floor are a great risk to your efficiency. For one, your negligence can put members of the team out of commission, directly affecting the overall productivity of the warehouse. However, it also shows the risks of the work to the other members of the team. This can cause their morale to take a hit and poor morale means employees that are less engaged with the work and thus likely to become less productive. Make sure you secure the environment with good lighting and non-slip mats where necessary, provide all the essential personal protection gear and, most importantly, hold regular briefings on different risks of the warehouse. It might seem a little boring, but it shows the workers you take their welfare seriously, as well as reducing the real risk of accidents happening.

Know your partners

Your warehouse is not an island, if you’re like most other businesses. You might work with your own suppliers and wholesalers who supply the inventory that you’re storing, or you might work with fulfilment services who go on to ensure your products end up where they need to be. Whatever your supply chain is, ensuring that it’s reliable is crucial to warehouse efficiency. Otherwise, your team might sit around waiting for inventory that haven’t arrived or be sitting on inventory that they’re waiting to ship. Supply management systems like Avercast can help you highlight potential problems in your supply chain, so you can communicate the issue with your partners and, if necessary, identify when you need to consider replacing them.

Make a lean packaging machine

If packaging products for delivery or transit is a part of your warehouse, then implementing a host of safe and efficient packaging tips can help you greatly speed up the inventory output of the whole team. Consider creating a factory line-like setup for your packaging team, where each employee takes care of one part of the process before passing it onto the next. Ensure their packaging space is designed ergonomically to reduce the risk of back or joint injury on the job, as well.

Beyond putting the systems you need in place, from more efficient energy use to tracking your products, you need to make sure that your management team is able to handle the busy nature of the warehouse. Having the right people in the role matters a great deal, as you need to ensure they can stay on top of the systems you establish.

This is an article provided by our partners network. It might not necessarily reflect the views or opinions of our editorial team and management.

Contributed content

Hernaldo Turrillo

Hernaldo Turrillo is a writer and author specialised in innovation, AI, DLT, SMEs, trading, investing and new trends in technology and business. He has been working for ztudium group since 2017. He is the editor of openbusinesscouncil.org, tradersdna.com, hedgethink.com, and writes regularly for intelligenthq.com, socialmediacouncil.eu. Hernaldo was born in Spain and finally settled in London, United Kingdom, after a few years of personal growth. Hernaldo finished his Journalism bachelor degree in the University of Seville, Spain, and began working as reporter in the newspaper, Europa Sur, writing about Politics and Society. He also worked as community manager and marketing advisor in Los Barrios, Spain. Innovation, technology, politics and economy are his main interests, with special focus on new trends and ethical projects. He enjoys finding himself getting lost in words, explaining what he understands from the world and helping others. Besides a journalist, he is also a thinker and proactive in digital transformation strategies. Knowledge and ideas have no limits.

The post Taking The Inefficiencies Out Of Your Warehouse appeared first on OpenBusinessCouncil Directory.