04/04/08 Autostore hits the spot for United Biscuits in record time
United Biscuits, consistently one of Europe's leading manufacturers and marketers of biscuits and snacks, has selected Autostore to manage operations at one of its UK and international Distribution Centres at Ashby-de-la-Zouch in the Midlands. The company is famous around the world for popular brands such as McVitie's, McCoy's, KP and Jacob's.
Two of the Ashby facilities (MDC and ADC) are key to keeping UB's supply chain running smoothly and act as the primary consolidation hubs for all UK and international operations. Autostore now runs the ADC buffer facility, a new site completed in 2006.
In an ambitious integration exercise that has consolidated business systems and real estate, UB has sought a step-change in efficiency and capability. UB's ADC operation has been redesigned, staffed, managed and brought online in under three months.
The ADC handles nearly 5.5 million cases on 106,000 pallets annually while also performing selected deliveries to UK multiples in excess of 3.7 million cases a year. In addition, the Autostore-controlled ADC looks after UB's export business handling over 4.3 million cases per year. UB wanted to introduce a flexible 3PL business model into UB's supply chain operations, deploying wireless broadband networking, wire guidance for vehicles and very narrow aisles for denser storage that would make available space work that much harder.
Willie Krupa is UB's Implementation Manager: "We had deliberately set the bar high in terms of what we wanted the ADC to achieve - and to deliver against expectation, it was clear we would need a very productive and powerful WMS infrastructure to pull it all together. Working with Central Systems, we completed the fine tuning of Autostore inside three months. It's a very robust solution with excellent field support - our own testing tells us that Autostore is as tough and as flexible as we'll foreseeably need - and that gives us tremendous confidence."
Autostore has enabled ADC's seamless integration with the Jacob's supply chain and improved acuracy throughout the supply chain.
Finishes Krupa: "Several optimisation projects are currently underway, driven by the view and grip of the business that Autostore gives us. We're running in-depth performance reporting and using its really handy graphical overlays to spot potential bottlenecks. Most important are the 'what if...?' simulations we can run with Autostore - we can see the effect of any changes we make before we make them and that's invaluable."
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For more information, please email Julian Wright.