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4 Warehouse Management System Case Studies

• July 23, 2020

Successful WMS Implementation Case Studies

Warehouse Management Systems (WMS) represent a major investment in your supply chain and operational efficiency. While it can be difficult to gauge your estimated time to value, these four cases featuring enVista clients provide a warehouse management system business case and showcase outcomes after successful WMS implementations.

In this post, we’ll cover four examples of WMS implementations and how they helped companies to optimize warehouse operations :

• Nature’s Best
• Performance Bike
• Bradshaw International
• Men’s Wearhouse

Four  WMS Implementation Examples

1. nature’s best.

*Note: Since project completion, Nature’s Best has been acquired by KeHE.*

Leading the market of health and natural foods distribution, Nature’s Best serves Certified Organic products in over twelve states. Nature’s Best was experiencing high labor costs based on time and manpower to transport temperature-controlled food products between four buildings on its DC campus. The company’s zones were organized to suit either small or large clients – a key competitive differentiator. Because of the facility layout, the overall distribution process was inefficient; each product was touched 18 times on its way to the customer. Nature’s Best technology, distribution processes and buildings also needed updating to keep pace with growth projections.

enVista was called upon to address and resolve the challenges Nature’s Best was facing and did so using its consult, implement and operate (CIO) methodology to create a customized solution.

Phase One: Consult

A supply chain strategy that met Nature’s Best’s business goals was developed. enVista conducted a material flow analysis and redesigned the internal flow processes to increase efficiencies. As a result, a global WMS was selected that addressed all of Nature’s Best’s concerns and determined construction needs for the distribution center (DC). Operations would be consolidated to one DC, and enVista designed the new facility with various temperature-controlled zones.

Phase Two: Implement

As Nature’s Best began construction, enVista supervised the integration and implemented a Manhattan Associates WMS including interface design, configuration, training, facility preparation and labor standards among other features. Nature’s Best shifted from a mechanized to non-mechanized system and from paper to radio-frequency (RF) devices with voice-based technology. enVista managed the move of $25 million of inventory and trained the company team on new system processes.

Phase Three: Operate

During go-live, enVista ensured a seamless transition into Nature’s Best new facility, systems and processes. Throughout the Consult, Implement, and Operate phases, sales were steady – even growing – and upon completion, the project was delivered on time and within budget. The chosen system required few modifications for Nature’s Best’s business model, which would lower costs and allow for easier upgrades in the future.

The new system reduced labor costs by over 30 percent and more than doubled productivity. Ninety-seven percent of full-time employees were retained, and temporary and non-value-added positions were eliminated. Nature’s Best went consultant-free only four weeks after go-live.

Download Nature’s Best Case Study

Example 2: Performance Bike

Performance Bike is a privately-held, specialty retailer focused on bicycles and accessories. The company had expanded to over 110 retail locations since its founding in 1982. Performance Bike had a DC in Chapel Hill, NC, with over 60 associates and partners with a 3PL in Long Beach, CA.

Due to compliance issues with the U.S. Postal Service barcodes, Performance Bike had to make system changes to its Manhattan PkMS WMS. The company’s experience with Manhattan Associates gave it a flexible approach when considering an upgrade. enVista’s enABLE methodology was used for the upgrade, and many of the roles typically filled by software or consulting companies were completed by Performance Bike.

Because of the prior experience and flexibility of Performance Bike and enVista, the WMS implementation was under budget and on time. Team members from both enVista and Performance Bike worked together to complete and implement the WMS. The vice president of warehouse operations for Performance Bike noted enVista’s customer-centric approach and flexibility.

The WMS upgrade was implemented in less than 6 months. There were very minor changes to the user experience, so trainings were seamless and increased productivity. Performance Bike experienced a pick per hour increase of 50 to 100 units per hour, exceeding the company’s executives’ expectations.

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Example 3: Bradshaw International

Bradshaw International’s Good Cook™ brand is sold in over 30,000 U.S. retail stores. Bradshaw is a leading marketer of kitchenware products and launched Good Cook to incorporate quality, value and service into every product. This philosophy has allowed Good Cook to achieve the best position for kitchen tools and gadgets with 43 percent of the market.

Bradshaw was asked to participate in Wal-Mart’s direct store delivery consolidation (DSDC) program as Good Cook is distributed in the stores. The program was designed to allow shippers to directly replenish Wal-Mart stores in less-than-case-pack quantities. To do so, Bradshaw had to make changes to several parts of its current distribution systems.

Changes to electric data interchange (EDI), order management, and a pick/pack operation integrated with a new WMS would be required to handle the new variable volumes. enVista was asked to help design and integrate the DSDC program. To meet Walmart’s DSDC objectives, the team had to design and build a new pick/pack module, select the technology to be used by the picking team, and integrate it with the WMS. The order management software , EDI software and billing system had to be modified to accommodate the structures required by Walmart’s DSDC program.

The team profiled SKU movements, identified pick and storage mediums to model replenishment rates, and formulated labor plans and proper work flows. Bradshaw IT and enVista worked together to make configuration changes to the RedPrairie WMS and integrate it with the Pick from Light System and EDI software. The joint team also specified data maps from order capture to order management to WMS through EDI transmissions to move the infrastructure to industry standards.

With enVista’s help, Bradshaw successfully integrated the DSDC program into operations. Shipping volumes increased beyond expectations, but the new WMS has allowed Bradshaw to keep up with demand. The program was implemented with almost no customer disruption.

Example 4: Men’s Wearhouse

Founded in 1973, Men’s Wearhouse is one of the country’s largest specialty retailers of men’s apparel with over 700 stores. The stores carry a full selection of high-end men’s clothing and accessories.

Men’s Warehouse’s main DC was a 1.1-million square foot facility in Houston, Texas. It is the core retail distribution center for Men’s Warehouse retail stores, as well as 60 percent of merchandise from K&G Retail stores, acquired in 1999. A significant percentage of its garment-on-hanger merchandise is shipped by dedicated fleet to regional hubs across the country. enVista’s main objective was to consolidate retail and e-commerce systems to run all operations on a single platform and a central material handling equipment (MHE) integration point.

enVista acted as the program management role for supply chain execution and MHE software functions for all facilities. The implementation of the new systems platform occurred in two distinct phases.

The first phase focused on using the new systems platform to more efficiently meet Men’s Wearhouse’s growing e-commerce business needs. A new WMS and distributed order management system were implemented and integrated to an e-commerce web platform. These systems allowed strategic decision making regarding e-commerce order fulfillment and room for growth, along with the accuracy and flexibility necessary for seamless execution and delivery.

Phase two focused on implementing the new WMS and a consolidated warehouse control system (WCS) in Men’s Wearhouse’s Retail Distribution Operation. The WMS replaced the retailer’s legacy system, and the WCS consolidated the management of several operations into one system. Men’s Wearhouse now has the ability to dynamically change product flow, unit allocation, and achieve more effective utilization of Case Level ASN receiving with the new WMS. The system’s ability to recognize and execute on cross-docking opportunities created improved throughput and lower overall processing costs.

With the implementation of a common WMS and standardized processes, Men’s Wearhouse was able to share recourses across operations and respond to seasonal increases in workload more effectively. The implementation of WMS and WCS gives the company the ability to consolidate its distinct Men’s Wearhouse and K&G distribution operations to reduce costs and increase overall processing efficiency.

Download Men’s Wearhouse Case Study

Conclusion: enVista’s WMS Expertise

Getting your WMS right and making sure it’s integrated properly across your supply chain technology stack is critical to realizing quick ROI and improved operational efficiencies. 

enVista has completed hundreds of WMS implementation projects in its nearly two decades of experience, and our vendor agnostic approach to consulting and implementation ensures you get objective help for your most critical projects. We’re passionate about supply chains and delivering solutions that are the right fit for our clients and would love to help you optimize your supply chain.

If you have a WMS project on the horizon or want to learn more about how we can help you, let’s have a conversation .

About the Author

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Warehouse Management Software: A Case Study 

• Post author: Maryliya M J
• Post published: January 11, 2024
• Reading time: 12 mins read

Warehouse Management Software (WMS): A Case Study 

Table of contents.

Warehouse management software (WMS) has become an integral tool for modern businesses seeking to optimize their supply chain operations. With the ever-increasing complexity of managing inventory, orders, and logistics, implementing an effective WMS solution can provide significant advantages.

Introduction to Warehouse Management Software (WMS)

Understanding warehouse management systems (wms).

Warehouse Management Software ( WMS ) is like your personal assistant for managing the chaos of a warehouse. It’s a fancy computer program that helps keep track of inventory, streamline processes, and make your life a whole lot easier. Think of it as the Hermione Granger of your warehouse – organized, efficient, and always on top of things.

Evolution and Advancements in WMS

Gone are the days of scribbling inventory numbers on a piece of paper and playing detective to find that missing box of widgets. WMS has come a long way since then. It has evolved from simple spreadsheets to sophisticated systems that can handle complex tasks like inventory tracking, order processing, and even automated picking and packing. It’s like upgrading from a flip phone to the latest iPhone – everything just works better.

Benefits of Implementing WMS

Implementing a WMS might sound like a hassle, but trust me, the benefits are totally worth it. With a WMS by your side, you can say goodbye to inventory nightmares, reduce errors, and improve overall efficiency. It’s like having a superpower that makes your warehouse run smoother than a freshly oiled machine. From enhanced inventory visibility to streamlined order fulfillment, WMS has your back.

About the Client

Our client, a prominent e-commerce company, faced challenges in efficiently managing its warehouse operations. With a growing inventory and increasing order volume, they recognized the need for a robust Warehouse Management Software (WMS) to streamline inventory tracking, order fulfillment, and overall warehouse efficiency. 

Project Overview

The project involved developing a .NET-based Warehouse Management Software that seamlessly integrated with the client’s existing systems. The primary objectives were to provide real-time visibility into stock levels, automate order processing, and optimize the warehouse layout for improved picking and packing processes. 

The Challenges

• Inefficient Inventory Tracking: The existing systems lacked real-time visibility, leading to inaccuracies in inventory tracking. 
• Manual Order Processing: Order fulfillment processes were time-consuming and prone to errors due to manual interventions. 
• Suboptimal Warehouse Layout: The warehouse layout needed optimization to enhance picking and packing efficiency. 

The Solution

Our team, comprising skilled developers and project managers, collaborated to design and implement a comprehensive Warehouse Management Software. Technologies such as .NET, SQL Server, and REST APIs were employed to ensure a robust and scalable solution. 

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Key features of the wms.

• Real-time Stock Visibility: The WMS provided instant visibility into stock levels, reducing the risk of stockouts and overstock situations. 
• Automated Order Processing: Orders were processed seamlessly, minimizing errors and accelerating the fulfillment process. 
• Optimized Warehouse Layout: The software employed intelligent algorithms to optimize the warehouse layout, resulting in improved picking and packing efficiency. 

The Outcome

The Warehouse Management Software was successfully deployed, leading to significant improvements in warehouse operations. The client reported enhanced efficiency in inventory management, reduced order processing times, and improved overall warehouse productivity. 

By leveraging the benefits of WMS, such as enhanced inventory visibility, streamlined order fulfillment processes, and improved accuracy and efficiency, the company was able to overcome their warehouse management challenges and achieve remarkable results. The lessons learned from this case study provide valuable insights for businesses considering the adoption of WMS, emphasizing the importance of careful selection, thorough implementation planning, and seamless integration with existing systems. Ultimately, the successful implementation of WMS opens doors to increased productivity, cost savings, and improved customer satisfaction, making it a strategic investment for any organization looking to optimize their warehouse operations.

Our team’s expertise in developing a tailored Warehouse Management Software using cutting-edge technologies resulted in a solution that addressed the client’s challenges effectively. The implementation of real-time visibility, automated order processing, and warehouse layout optimization contributed to a more streamlined and efficient warehouse operation. 

Are you facing similar challenges in warehouse management? Contact us today to explore how our expertise in WMS development can transform your warehouse operations and drive efficiency. 

What is Warehouse Management Software (WMS) and why is it important?

Warehouse Management Software (WMS) is a software solution designed to efficiently manage and control various aspects of warehouse operations, including inventory management, order fulfillment, and logistics. It is important because it helps businesses optimize their warehouse processes, improve inventory accuracy, streamline operations, enhance productivity, and ultimately deliver better customer service.

How does a WMS solution benefit businesses?

A WMS solution offers numerous benefits to businesses. It provides real-time visibility into inventory levels and locations, enabling effective inventory management and reducing stockouts. It automates and streamlines order fulfillment processes, improving speed and accuracy while reducing errors. WMS also optimizes warehouse layout, resource allocation, and workflow, leading to increased operational efficiency, productivity, and cost savings.

What considerations should businesses keep in mind when selecting a WMS solution?

When selecting a WMS solution, businesses should consider factors such as scalability, ease of integration with existing systems, customization options, vendor support, and cost. It is crucial to assess specific business requirements, evaluate the software’s functionality, and determine whether it aligns with the organization’s long-term goals. Conducting thorough research, seeking recommendations, and requesting demos or trials can help make an informed decision.

Is it challenging to integrate WMS with existing systems and processes?

Integrating WMS with existing systems and processes can present challenges, mainly due to differences in data structures, formats, and compatibility. It requires careful planning, data migration, and coordination between the WMS provider and internal IT teams. However, with proper communication, collaboration, and expert guidance, businesses can overcome integration challenges and achieve seamless connectivity between WMS and other enterprise systems.

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Case Studies of Successful Custom WMS Implementations

Commonly, we study the success stories of others to get inspiration and find new ideas for improving our business or personal efficiency. As a custom WMS development partner, we at HQSofware, also follow best practices and trends to deliver top-notch solutions to our clients. However, based on our WMS development experience, we can already share our own examples of winning warehouse management systems.

In this article, we’ll take a look at 5 successful examples of WMS software to understand how to implement such a system to enhance warehouse productivity.

What is a Custom WMS?

Developing an E-3PL System for Warehouse Automation

Implementing Predictive Analytics for Smart Inventory Management

Providing Warehouse Navigation to Speed Up Order Picking

Improving Supply Management with a WMS

Developing a WMS Module to Boost Marketplace Operations

How to Maximize WMS Efficiency?

A warehouse management system (WMS) is a powerful tool that optimizes and streamlines warehouse operations, including inventory management, picking and packing processes, shipping management, etc. A custom WMS, designed according to your unique workflow, eliminates unnecessary features and offers a user-friendly interface. With custom WMS development , you can prioritize factors that are crucial for your organization, ensuring that the system aligns perfectly with your unique business needs.

Let’s take a look at some custom WMS examples and how they’ve helped to overcome warehouse challenges for their respective owners.

It’s no longer enough for a modern warehouse management system to merely provide inventory visibility and assist in order picking and packing. Companies are now striving to maximize operational efficiency by choosing smart systems with advanced features that can simultaneously address a wide range of issues.

In line with this trend, a US-based startup embarked on the development of comprehensive WMS software that adheres to modern requirements. A large international team of developers, including HQSoftware specialists, was involved in the project.

The main goal was to create an advanced system that can automate and optimize many logistics processes and perform some of them autonomously. For example: automatically generate replenishment orders based on customer demand forecasts, or update goods availability and price for buyers in real-time.

In addition, the system facilitates warehouse audits, provides enhanced navigation, integrates with numerous third-party systems, and enables express picking and receiving. With all its innovative features, the E-3PL platform boasts an impressive 99.9% order accuracy and 99.4% same-day order delivery.

This WMS implementation case study highlights the potential for comprehensive software to enhance virtually any warehouse operation. Achieving this requires a thorough analysis of every process within your warehouse and careful consideration of how advanced technology can drive improvements. This is especially beneficial if you decide to turn to custom WMS software development , as this allows you to build a system that meets your business needs in the best possible way.

Not wasting financial resources and being able to meet changing customer demand are deeply desired by every business and a must-have feature of modern WMS software.

Our client approached us with just such a request. They needed to upgrade a legacy WMS and implement predictive analytics capabilities to optimize warehouse inventory.

To accomplish this, our development team carefully selected the most suitable Machine Learning models capable of analyzing both historical and real-time operational data. The system provides data-driven replenishment recommendations tailored to specific parameters such as supplier delivery terms and minimum stock quantities. As a result, the client was able to reduce inventory costs by 15%.

The power of predictive analytics lies in its ability to learn and adapt to your unique business characteristics, offering personalized recommendations on how to improve it. So, you can benefit from optimal stock levels, excess-cost elimination, efficient space utilization, and a proactive response to customer needs, gaining a strong competitive edge in the market.

Since goods in a warehouse are not arranged as in a supermarket but are stored in boxes with numerical location identifiers, finding the right item can be a daunting task for pickers.

To address this WMS challenge and streamline order picking, our client — a retail company from Germany — decided to implement enhanced warehouse navigation . The feature creates optimized picking routes according to the picker and other items’ location and warehouse configuration.

The solution is delivered as a cross-platform mobile app that provides a map with a picking route and offers voice and visual guidance. With the app, pickers now spend 25% less time on order picking .

Even if you have many large warehouses with different layouts, this is no reason to overlook such a feature. Our developers can create an intuitive graphical interface that allows you to create any warehouse layout, as was implemented in this WMS case study.

Want to create a WMS solution to improve your warehouse operations? We’re ready to help! HQSoftware has a team of skilled professionals ready to tackle the project. Let’s talk! Anna Halias Business Development Manager Get a Free Quote

In an ideal world, all suppliers would have compatible systems that seamlessly integrate with your WMS. However, in reality, you may encounter scenarios where a vendor relies on Google Spreadsheets for inventory tracking or where having a large number of suppliers makes collaboration within a single WMS challenging.

Well, we know several examples of WMSs that include a separate platform for onboarding and communicating with suppliers. We’ve developed such a platform as well . It enables a US retailer to connect with all suppliers in a single interface. Here, suppliers can upload product catalogs, manage item availability, and set prices, while the customer can place purchase orders and establish collaborative agreements.

An important feature of this platform is its ability to handle various data formats, enabling suppliers to post catalogs in their preferred format, which was quite a challenge for our development team. We also ensured system scalability, enabling the customer to expand their network of suppliers.

With this platform, the customer now enjoys seamless order placement, improved supply management, and a 37% reduction in product delivery delays.

The process of publishing and updating items on a single marketplace is relatively straightforward. You fill out the product details, add images, and configure display settings. This is true for several products or catalogs hosted on a single platform. But when you’re a 3PL provider responsible for hosting hundreds of clients with thousands of items on multiple marketplaces, it’s more like a nightmare.

Therefore, for one of the 3PL providers, the HQSoftware team has developed a module for the company’s custom supply chain software system that can automatically publish and update catalogs on several marketplaces and allows for manual item updates within one interface. By synchronizing with the customer’s system, the module ensures consistent and accurate data across platforms.

Within the module, the customer can also customize the display of different products according to specific parameters, such as particular display times, different prices for different times of the day, etc. With robust data exchange mechanisms implemented by our team, the module seamlessly uploads files with all data, speeding up product management tasks by 30%.

Even if you’re not a 3PL provider, such a feature can greatly simplify marketplace management. You no longer have to manually navigate through each product listing on every platform to make changes. All this can be done with a few clicks through a user-friendly interface.

Based on the expertise we’ve gained from our WMS implementation case studies, we understand that leveraging the advantages of WMS software takes more than simply finding or developing a suitable system. It’s also important to focus on proper WMS implementation . Consider the following actions.

• Define system requirements . Conduct a thorough analysis of your warehouse operations to understand how a new system can automate and improve established processes. This analysis will help you define the specific requirements for your WMS.
• Create an implementation plan. The step-by-step plan will help you overview the whole cycle of WMS implementation and control the progress. A common WMS implementation project plan example includes several key phases, starting with planning, then analysis, then implementation, testing, training, and finally, deployment.
• Clean up data. It’s a good idea to get rid of outdated or duplicate information that can lead to errors and slow down the process of migrating data to the new WMS.
• Integrate a WMS with other systems. This greatly enriches WMS functionality and allows you to get valuable insights from both internal and external platforms.
• Test a WMS. Verify that the system can process all your data smoothly without any interruptions or delays. It is important to test the system’s interaction with third-party systems and ensure it meets the needs of end-users.
• Train employees. Comprehensive training ensures that your employees know how to use the system effectively and helps overcome potential resistance to change. Create visual and interactive manuals and step-by-step tutorials that employees can refer to when they encounter difficulties.

But one of the most important factors in successfully implementing a WMS is choosing a reliable and trusted WMS provider, especially if you opt for a custom WMS. The capabilities of your system and its successful implementation will depend directly on the expertise of your development partner.

At HQSoftware, we have extensive experience not only in creating comprehensive WMS systems but also in working with cutting-edge technologies that can enhance WMS functionality, such as Artificial Intelligence , Machine Learning , IoT , etc. Contact us to learn more about our WMS development services.

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To ensure the outstanding quality of HQSoftware’s solutions and services, I took the position of Head of Production and manager of the Quality Assurance department. Turn to me with any questions regarding our tech expertise.

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Logistics and Supply Chain Case Studies

Review our case studies to see how we’ve helped major corporations turn logistical ideas into a reality., leading beverage distributor, penske logistics helps beverage distributor rapidly establish new warehousing operations.

When this distributor had to expand its operation quickly to counter a competitor, they turned to Penske to deploy a customized solution.

Baby2Baby Donation Transportation

Coordination and planning lead to successful transport of $3 million clothing donation.

Penske Logistics worked with Baby2Baby, a nonprofit that provides basic essentials to impoverished children, and Old Navy to transport $3M of clothing donations.

Luxury Product Manufacturer

Penske logistics reduces inventory shrinkage, improves overall inventory management.

A leading producer of fine luxury products required a partner who could improve their warehouse and distribution operations and reduce the theft.

Poultry Supplier

Transporting food items requires extra care and expertise.

Poultry producers, navigate a complex array of supply and delivery challenges to ensure their food arrives fresh, wholesome, and on-time.

Building Products Manufacturer

Customized fleet technology solution.

A leading building products manufacturer sought to streamline its supply chain operations and expand its fleet while improving visibility through the implementation of fleet management technology.

National Wholesale Distributor

A national wholesale distributor case study.

A national wholesale distributor of heating and air conditioning supplies was struggling to manage its complex supply chain and maintain high levels of customer service, which is a top priority.

Looping Process Ensures Continuous Production

Penske collaborated with Novelis to create a closed-loop recycling network that moves finished aluminum coils and transports scrap for new production.

A Global Manufacturer

Optimizing activities in the distribution center.

Penske worked with this global manufacturer to optimize its inventory routing and mode selection and to improve visibility to its supply chain.

Quick Service Restaurant

Food and beverage in-store delivery and warehousing.

Penske helped this restaurant chain get its supply chain fundamentals in place with the right logistics tools, truck driver training and warehousing solutions.

Tier 1 Automotive Component Supplier

Managing the inbound supply chain.

Penske helped this supplier minimize supply chain disruptions by designing a network that optimized mode selection, routing and analysis.

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Amazon Adopts Amazon Aurora for Inventory Database

Choosing the Cloud

In May 2017, AFT decided to migrate the system to Amazon Aurora . A MySQL- and PostgreSQL-compatible database built for the cloud, Aurora provides the performance and availability of Oracle at approximately one-tenth the cost. Amazon Aurora is fully managed by Amazon Relational Database Service (Amazon RDS), which automates time-consuming administration tasks such as hardware provisioning, database setup, patching, and backups.

PostgreSQL was selected as the database because it could handle complex write transactions at speeds comparable to the Oracle system. “Our writes have a lot of components,” says Michael Wu, principal software development engineer at Amazon. “They include things like location, current state, and financial operations. The PostgreSQL-compatible edition of Amazon Aurora offers high performance for these scenarios.”

High-Stakes Migration, Managed

Once Amazon Aurora was selected, the team began planning the migration. AFT took a replatforming approach, preserving existing service architectures and database schemas to minimize complexity and disruption. Replatforming allowed more than 200 external services to migrate their dependencies with minor code changes.

Automation was essential to enabling such a large-scale migration. “Manual deployment simply wouldn’t work,” says Wu. “We wanted to migrate as quickly as possible by building mechanisms that would allow teams to manage the migration effectively.”

AWS Database Migration Service was used to migrate data from the Oracle databases to the PostgreSQL databases running on Amazon Aurora. Thanks to the modular nature of AWS, it took a team averaging three engineers only three months to complete the automation framework.

Because of the need for always-on operations in the fulfillment centers, the downtime window for the migration in each center was only two hours. Thanks to the automation built in the first stage, the team maintained a 100 percent migration success rate. “It’s always challenging to migrate a large system in a short time frame, but with AWS Database Migration Service, we were able to far exceed the initial expectations,” says Anthony Girolamo, senior software development manager at Amazon.

Keeping Up with Business Growth

The elastic capacity of preconfigured database hosts on AWS eliminated much of the administrative overhead required to scale the system. The transformation has been significant. “In the Oracle world, a seemingly simple change such as scaling from a medium to a large database instance required provisioning hardware, standing up primary and standby databases, and managing failover during transitions, which could take a full day for each instance,” says Bigonger. “Not to mention the fact that we were using specialized hardware that had to be ordered months in advance. After migrating to Amazon Aurora, provisioning additional capacity is achieved through a few simple mouse clicks or API calls.” The scaling effort has been reduced by as much as 95 percent.

High availability is another key benefit of Amazon Aurora. “Previously, if we lost a piece of hardware, it would impact our ability to maintain redundancy for up to a day,” says Bigonger. “With Amazon Aurora, reprovisioning happens automatically in just minutes, ensuring data is always fully protected.”

With the performance of Amazon Aurora, the team is no longer limited by the input/output operations the database instance can handle. “During the process, we shed software ‘technical debt,’ making our software systems better and enabling greater agility,” says Wu. “Our engineers can kickstart projects by spinning up their own test instances whenever they need to. It took the complexity out of the process.”

Migrating IMS to Amazon Aurora resulted in a range of benefits—the most important of which is dependable fulfillment for customers. “Using Amazon Aurora, we can keep up with Amazon’s business growth,” says Girolamo. “That means customers get products faster—which is why we do what we do.”

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Amazon.com migrated 5,000 databases from Oracle to AWS, cutting its annual database operating costs by more than half and reducing the latency of most critical services by 40 percent. The company leverages Amazon DynamoDB to scale Prime Video and Amazon SageMaker to indentify misplaced inventory.

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As part of its strategy to build a platform that could scale to meet projected needs for at least 10 years, Amazon decided to migrate Prime Video to AWS. The migration would replace CQS with a suite of 12 microservices, built using a range of AWS services that included Amazon DynamoDB, AWS Lambda, and Amazon Simple Queue Service (Amazon SQS).

Amazon Robotics Uses Amazon SageMaker to Enable ML Inferencing at Scale

Amazon Robotics developed a sophisticated machine learning model using Amazon SageMaker to streamline inventory management, halving inferencing costs and improving inventory stow rate.

Amazon Advertising Case Study

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Amazon.com Buyer Fraud Service Gains Scalability, Cuts Costs in Half Using AWS

Amazon Transaction Risk Management Services (TRMS) migrated more than 100 on-premises Oracle databases to AWS. Because the Buyer Fraud Service is a critical application and must operate at 99.995 percent availability, TRMS decided to use PostgreSQL-compatible Amazon Aurora as the new platform to host its databases.

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Amazon Speeds Desktop Deployment for 25,000 Global Workers Using Amazon WorkSpaces

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Learn more about Amazon Aurora .

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MARCH 24, 2023

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In this article, we’ll showcase Amware's flexible warehousing solutions in helping Public Goods respond to a 500% spike in orders. This is certainly true within the world of logistics, where order volumes – especially those for essential household products – have increased dramatically since March.

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Sitma, a specialist in designing and producing solutions for automation in the logistics industry, has been chosen as a case study for the book Essentials of Modern Marketing by Philip Kotler together with Weevo, which looked at more than 30 examples of outstanding Italian companies in different fields of production.

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Tech Trends Will conveyors continue to play a key role in warehousing ? There has been a gold rush of entrants to the AMR market so we can evaluate the case studies . Complex sites with multiple warehouse control systems (WCS) not communicating can be improved with one WCS from us. But it’s not a big value-add.

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Industrial Management & Data Systems

ISSN : 0263-5577

Article publication date: 1 December 1999

The warehouse is the interface area for production lines, market, customers and suppliers, and the business environment in general. Goods inwards (GI), constituting part of the warehouse activities, is the department responsible for booking‐in the incoming parts from external suppliers. After the production process is improved, the resources in the warehouse are balanced to link the internal/ external transfer of physical items. With a broader view of the GI activities, and a look into its future, the actual problems may become clear, understandable, and hence easy to solve. The aim of this paper is to study the problem areas in GI and provide solutions to increase the performance of warehousing operations. First, a conceptual framework has been developed to improve the effectiveness of warehousing operations. Second, a case study has been conducted with the help of the model to minimize the through‐put time in warehousing operations. Finally, a summary of findings and recommendations are presented.

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Gunasekaran, A. , Marri, H.B. and Menci, F. (1999), "Improving the effectiveness of warehousing operations: a case study", Industrial Management & Data Systems , Vol. 99 No. 8, pp. 328-339. https://doi.org/10.1108/02635579910291975

Copyright © 1999, MCB UP Limited

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Amazon: a case study in how strategic warehouse placement can drastically reduce shipping times.

Updated: Apr 27, 2022

Few businesses can compete with Amazon—not just as a retailer, but also in shipping, data management, and even warehousing. To become the juggernaut it is today, Amazon has evolved to provide many of its necessary service needs. 

For its warehousing needs alone, for example, Amazon reportedly owns nearly 319 million square feet of fulfillment center floor space in the United States. Though that is a massive number, consider that Amazon’s warehouse placement is designed to keep shipping times as low as possible. In other words, Amazon warehouses have been strategically placed all over the country. 

Strategic warehousing allows Amazon to ensure that goods are already nearby when a customer places an order. It also enables the company to focus on efficiency and cost-effectiveness for shipping. This is how Amazon can offer free next-day or two-day shipping.  

With these facts in mind, let’s look at how strategic warehouse placement can help other companies reduce their shipping times. 

Less Time on the Road

Transportation occupations are some of the most dangerous jobs . In 2018 alone, workers’ injuries and illnesses in transportation and material moving accounted for 20% of all injuries. These statistics also include related transportation roles, such as mechanics and transport-related warehouse jobs.

Strategic warehouse placement reduces the time that trucks and other transport options need to be used. Shorter travel periods can also decrease the time that vehicles are on the road and, thus, can help with driver fatigue. Furthermore, using strategic warehouse placement in high-volume areas will:

• Ensure the fastest shipping times by decreasing the hindrance of supply bottlenecks.
• Keep high-volume items well-stocked, eliminating unplanned shipments.
• Benefit from courier usage to deliver goods where larger delivery options may struggle (such as residential or historic areas).  

Additionally, warehouses built in strategic locations can reduce the load of other warehouses. Not only does this decrease shipping times in the area, but it also increases the efficiency of the once-beleaguered warehouse.

Optimization In, Optimization Out

A strategically placed warehouse is optimized inside and out. Shipping costs and speeds are affected by more than the distance. Without optimized functions and employees, warehouses and shipping will suffer.

No matter the industry, however, warehouse safety is essential. Injured workers won’t be working, and could be costing money. Perhaps more importantly, a poorly managed warehouse will drag down morale, handling speeds, and efficiency. Mistakes will pile up, just like the hazards that surround the workers.

To achieve an optimized and safe warehouse, the following guidelines must be followed:

• Rigid daily protocols, especially around safety, awareness, and internal assistance.
• Incentivize safe efficiency, not bottom-line numbers. Breakneck speed is only temporarily sustainable.
• Storage and organization pipelines must always be adhered to.
• Use optimized scheduling to keep shipping and receiving on different shifts.

Each of the above-mentioned tips not only ensures smooth operations, but also keeps the employees and their safety in mind. Unless the warehouse is entirely automated, optimization must consider the humans within.  

Technology and automation should still be used, but focus on systems that work with the human element in mind. Use machine learning and logic-oriented technologies to study your warehouse statistics. Optimize how the team at hand works, instead of forcing them into a “pre-optimized mold.” 

In short, if the warehouse and its employees are optimized, then shipping times too will be optimized.

Strategic Location Keeps the Goods Close By

Today’s supply chain management goals are meant to ensure customer satisfaction . Two-day or next-day shipping is no longer a leg up over other services. Rapid shipping is now the expected offering. Larger fleets or faster processing lines alone won’t speed up shipping times if the warehouse is located across the country.

Therefore, strategically placing warehouses ensures that goods are always within your customers’ desired shipping times. Amazon’s vast number of warehouses allow for same-day shipping in some areas. Often, within hours of an online order, the purchased item is at the customer’s door. It doesn’t get much faster than that. This is achieved by the vast amount of strategic square footage Amazon devotes to customer satisfaction.

Of course, not every business can afford millions of feet of storage space. Still, a company can decide where best to locate the storage it can afford. For example, warehouses next to major shipping hubs can take better advantage of increased shipping options. Major metropolitan areas benefit from having warehouses nearby, especially in high-volume areas.

Large metropolitan areas also provide other strategic benefits, including:

• Better access to existing infrastructure.
• A more significant potential labor pool.
• A greater area of serviceable customers, plus the ability to offer reduced shipping times to a major section of customers.

Keeping warehouses close to the manufacturing locations can reduce shipping times on the back end. However, strategically located warehouses next to major shipping hubs can benefit from nearly the same back-end fulfillment, and provide customers with even quicker delivery times.

Final Thoughts

Warehouses use massive amounts of capital, both in start-up mode and during normal operations. They can be dangerous, especially with a high-velocity mix of employees and machinery. Warehouse use and placement must therefore be strategic to maximize efficiency at all levels. From employee safety to customer satisfaction, where you place a warehouse has long-existing ramifications. 

Companies have found success working backward with the customer as the end goal. Strategically located warehouses allow logistics to focus on the fastest route to the customer. Be it extra stock for a high-volume item, or simply shorter shipping times from the warehouse to the customer’s door, warehouse placement is critical.

Rachel Perez is an Outreach Associate with North Star Inbound and wrote this piece working in tandem with BigRentz . An honors graduate of New York University, she is passionate about writing about business, e-commerce, construction, and travel. When not writing, she enjoys spending time in the Florida sunshine.

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Getting a handle on warehousing costs

The painful truth about warehousing—across virtually all industries and geographic markets—is that most companies don’t really know what their true costs should be. Operations leaders know what they’re spending, and they likely know that they need to spend less. Worldwide, warehousing operations cost companies  about €300 billion each year , and that amount is growing as global supply chains and the prevalence of e-commerce lead to greater complexity.

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In May 2019, the United States Bureau of Labor Statistics estimated that 1.2 million Americans work in warehouses as supervisors, material handlers, or packers—a high and fast-increasing share of the total labor force. But if you ask most operations leaders what their lowest potential costs could be for a given facility, they simply do not know the answer.

Why not? Most companies don’t have a clear methodology for determining those costs. They may have put out a tender for outsourced services through a third-party logistics (3PL) provider. That’s a good way to find out what someone will charge you, but not what the underlying activities truly cost. And without knowing what costs should be for a specific warehouse, any improvement initiative to reduce spending and increase efficiency is bound to fall short. Operations managers have little idea of what kind of gains they can generate—or where. It is like running a race without knowing where the finish line is.

Our independent research over the past decade, including detailed analyses of more than 1,000 warehouses in key industries and geographies worldwide, shows that many companies’ costs are dramatically higher than they should be. We also found that companies can accurately size this gap only by assessing warehouse costs through a bottom-up analysis that determines the ideal cost structure for a given facility. Through this process, companies can prioritize their improvement initiatives, leading to potential gains of 15 to 20 percent.

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Where benchmarks fall short.

In our experience, there are usually two ways for companies to assess warehouse spend for a given process area. The first is a top-down analysis that relies on industry benchmarks. However, benchmarks can be blunt instruments. They are often available only at a high level, such as total warehouse cost as a percentage of cost of goods sold or per case, compared with last year’s budgets. Furthermore, benchmarks fail to factor in unique service offerings. Different product portfolios, order patterns, delivery standards, supply-chain requirements, and other attributes can all affect warehousing costs significantly, even for companies in the same industry.

The second—and far more precise—way to analyze warehouse costs is a bottom-up, “ cleansheet ” calculation. A cleansheet is a mathematical model that determines the true costs for a given warehouse, in terms of space, labor, and equipment. The critical advantage of this approach is that it lets companies drill down into the three biggest cost drivers of a warehouse and see where a company is paying more than it should (Exhibit 1). The goal is to identify the lowest possible cost of each component, rather than the actual cost the company is now paying. By isolating components in that way, companies can tackle the biggest discrepancies and problem areas.

A closer look at processes and spaces

The first step is to look at processes, which means taking a close look at labor. The cleansheet analysis looks at actual warehouse activity levels and volumes, and determines the average processing time—i.e., how much time should be spent on each activity. Companies can then convert that result into a cost, using a factor cost base with country-specific average labor rates for given types of work.

Next, the cleansheet factors in space and equipment. These aspects are crucial given that processing times in a warehouse are typically linked to walking or driving within storage aisles, and that some equipment dictates a certain aisle width. Using both inputs, a cleansheet computes the warehouse space needed to handle annual volume at specific service levels. The analysis also includes the running costs, or opex, and investments, or capex, for selected material-handling equipment and racking configurations.

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Once companies have a true idea of their reasonable costs for a facility, they can compare those data to real-world warehouse costs for their industry and geographic market. The areas with the biggest gaps are the most immediate priorities for improvement. Onsite warehouse walkthroughs and assessments of the main warehouse processes can validate the cleansheet calculation’s assumptions and areas it has identified for improvement.

The improvements themselves run the gamut from optimizing layouts to redesigning processes, improving performance management, and potentially installing automation systems. Notably, automation can lead to significant improvements, but it is not always the best answer . Implementation costs can be high, and some systems may not be flexible enough to adapt to changing market conditions.

But regardless of the specific changes the company implements, it’s often possible to multiply the gains by applying improvements across all warehouses in an organization. In some cases, they can number in the hundreds worldwide.

Even companies that use a 3PL provider can benefit from this kind of cleansheet analysis, as it can help them prepare for ongoing and future contract negotiations. While executives might assume that these vendors would naturally have the most cost-efficient processes, our research found that 3PL providers often show significant variability in cost and performance levels. For example, 3PL providers often work on shorter-term contracts that limit their ability to make structural changes in a warehouse. A neutral cleansheet result therefore has the potential to benefit both parties by identifying opportunities to improve the performance management of global warehouses over time.

Put simply, companies will not be able to improve warehouse performance and costs until they have a clear and detailed understanding of where the key problems lie. Cleansheet analyses can generate cost transparency in a matter of days, and reveal significant opportunity for improvement— particularly when combined with warehouse visits (Exhibit 2).

Once companies understand their biggest problem areas, the next step could be a digital warehouse design: creating a “digital twin” of any existing warehouse facility to model the impact of changes to the layout and workflow, before moving physical assets, making investments or changing warehouse 3PL providers. Together, these two tools—cleansheet analysis and digital warehouse design—provide substantial new opportunities to capture value in global warehousing.

Jörn Herrmann is a senior expert in McKinsey’s Zurich office, where Vera Trautwein is an operations specialist; Fernando Perez is a partner in the Miami office; and Markus Weidmann is an associate partner in the Munich office.

The authors wish to thank Knut Alicke for his contributions to this article.

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Watch: A Symphony of Systems: The Rise of Warehouse Orchestration

Warehouse orchestration is the answer for facilities looking to integrate and efficiently manage a multitude of discrete systems, says Keith Moore, chief executive officer of  Autoscheduler.ai . 

The concept of “orchestration” is gaining popularity in the warehouse. The term describes the ability to take all of the systems and people that exist within a given facility — what Moore describes as “as multi-faceted ensemble cast” — and get them to function together smoothly.

Who, then, is the “conductor” of this symphony of systems and processes? Today it’s people, Moore says. The problem is that, because of the difficultly of retaining qualified staff, those individuals are often less tenured and experienced in their jobs than in years past. And when that happens, “productivity drops drastically.”

Thanks to an aging warehouse workforce, some 80% of sites are run by coordinators with four years or less of experience. Yet it takes three to four years just to get a facility up and running effectively. Moreover, the work is often managed by spreadsheets and other outdated manual processes. “Excel is the most used tool in a warehouse,” Moore says. As a result, many warehouses today are supported by “grit and elbow grease,” he says. “In the future, that has to change.”

Automation is coming to the fore, but the necessary systems still must be coordinated in such a way that warehouses can track, on a moment-by-moment basis, key elements such the availability of labor, raw materials, inventory, space and trailers in the yard.  All must work together to support efficient process flow.

The next five years will see the emergence of systems enabling predictive visibility, as sites move toward operation by “autopilot.” But that can’t happen, Moore says, unless people and technology within the warehouse are designed to work in concert.

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