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If you are looking to improve the overall warehouse efficiency but you are unsure where to start, then these few tips should help to give you some ideas of what you can do to get started.
When you own a successful eCommerce business it is likely you are going to have a warehouse where you sort your stock and ensure the smooth operation of your business. You may even have multiple warehouses around the world but if any of them are not efficient enough it can impact your business. If you have built your business on how quick your turnaround is and how well you package and sort your products and this starts slipping it can cause a loss of customers which over time will affect the business.
If you are worried about your warehouse efficiency and you are unsure of the best ways you can improve this then hopefully, these few tips will help you to understand what you can do to start improving your efficiency.
Make sure to utilise all your warehouse space
It is all well and good using the whole floor of your warehouse but if you need more space do not instantly look to expand the size of your warehouse. You should instead look vertically and look to utilise the space higher up, that way you can utilise all the space you have to work with. You could install taller storage units, elevators to platforms higher up and so on, this will more likely be a cheaper investment than having to expand and get more machinery to then fill that space.
Get better technology to run your warehouse
By getting a warehouse management system (WMS) will expand the efficiency, you can even look to install superior conveyor systems for your warehouse to increase the efficiency. With a good WMS it can suggest the best routes for picking and sorting and also generate automated pick lists to be sent to the mobile readers; this will decrease paper waste and reduce mistakes when picking items. Not only will it make your warehouse a bit neater but also increase how green your warehouse is too.
Make sure to keep workers and workstations organised
You can lose efficiency in your warehouse just by having untidy workstations, as this can lead to downtime of staff looking for tools etc. by implementing a good workstation organisation plan you can make sure all workstations remain tidy and do not lead to the downtime you might be seeing from staff, this will increase the overall efficiency. The best way to do this is to reduce clutter and only allow work things at the stations so you can minimise what is on the stations.
You can also look to make your workers more efficient with better picking plans that are created by your WMS or manually. You should also look to have the products that are ordered online the most being put together so that it is easier for pickers to locate them and also means if things are ordered together a lot they are not running all over the place to find them.
