Modern Materials Handling - December 2011

modern system reportreceives an advanced ship notification(ASN) detailing the contents of a shipmentprior to the arrival of a containerat the receiving dock (1). The contentsof the floor-loaded containers are puton a belt conveyor (2) and a licenseplate label on the carton is read by astationary scanner.Inbound product can be handledin several ways. Some items will beautomatically conveyed to a palletizingarea (3) where the cartons are sortedby style, color and size. Preprinted palletlabels are applied to a pallet. Anassociate scans the pallet label and theproduct label to associate the productson the pallet with that license plate inthe warehouse management system(WMS). Other items will go througha preliminary step before they are sentto the palletizing area. For instance,items that are new to the facility arerouted first to a cubing and weighingstation where information about theproduct is gathered for storage andshipping purposes. Other productsmay be routed first to an inboundquality assurance area (4). In eithercase, after that preliminary process iscompleted, the cartons will be conveyedto the palletizing area. Palletsare then staged for pick up by a lifttruck operator.Putaway: Once a pallet is stagedfor pick up, a task is sent to a lift truckoperator. The WMS uses task interleavingto optimize processes, so a lift truckdriver assigned to the task may also bedoing replenishment activities. Palletsare delivered to a drop off location inthe very narrow aisle rack reserve storagearea (5). Turret truck operators aretypically assigned to one, two or threeaisles. The operator scans the palletand is directed to a putaway location.Once there, he scans a location barcode to confirm the putaway and is thenassigned another task by the WMS.Picking: Skechers fills orders fromseveral different retail channels. Tothe automated system, however, theprocess is the same. Depending onthe order, product can be pulled fromreserve storage (5) or from the miniloadAS/RS used to store loose picks(6). A loose pick is a partially full opencarton that has already been used inpart to fill other orders.• Mini-load picks: Loose pickcartons are conveyed from the miniloadto an induction station (7) for thecross-belt sortation system (8). Thelicense plate bar code label on the cartonis scanned by a stationary scannerin route. The SKUs and the numberof shoes to be pulled from that mastercarton are displayed on a monitor.Shoe boxes are placed on an inductionconveyor, where they enter the sortationsystem. The shoes are then sortedto a packing chute and delivered to thepacking area (9). If the order doesn’trequire all of the contents of the mastercarton, it will be conveyed back to themini-load (6) for storage.• Storage area picks: Items thatcan’t be filled from the mini-load areretrieved from the reserve storage (5)area. The WMS assigns the task to anorder picker who will pick the cartonsto a pallet. Once all of the cartons forthat task have been picked, the palletis delivered to a case induction area(7) adjacent to the pallet building area.Once the pallet is scanned, the cartonsare placed on an induction conveyor andare sorted to a packing chute area (9).Packing and shipping: Pairs comingdown a packing chute into thepacking area (9) have already beencubed by the WMS, which determineswhat size shipping case to use for anorder. That information is sent to thehandheld scanner used by packers. Theright size carton is removed from anoverhead conveyor. Once the contentsfor that order are loaded into the shippingcontainer, the associate scans alicense plate bar code label on the container,the bar code label on the chuteSystem suppliersSystems integration: Wynright,wynright.comMini-load automated storage andretrieval systems: Daifuku Webb,daifukuamerica.comConveyor system: Automotion,automotionconveyors.comCross-belt unit sortation system: BeumerGroup, beumer.com/enNarrow belt shipping sorter: TGWSystems, tgw-group.comWMS: Manhattan Associates, manh.comLift trucks: Raymond, raymondcorp.comBar code scanning: Psion, psion.com/usPallet rack: Hannibal Industries, e-hii.comCubing and weighing: Cubiscan, cubiscan.comand then seals the container with tape.The outbound shipping label is automaticallyapplied at a print-and-applystation. At that point, the carton will behandled in one of three ways.• Direct to shipping: Cartons thatare ready to ship as is are conveyeddirectly to the shipping area (10) wherethey will be palletized and stretchwrappedfor Skechers stores or wholesalecustomers that order by the pallet.Everything else will be floor-loaded inan outbound trailer. The order is nowready to ship.• Value-added services: Othercartons will be sent to a value-addedservices area (11) on the mezzaninelevel where special labeling will beapplied. From the value-added servicesarea, the cartons will be conveyed tothe shipping area (10) for palletizing orfloor loading into a trailer.• Buffer storage in the miniloadAS/RS: Remaining cartons willbe stored temporarily in the facility’ssecond mini-load AS/RS, known asa pack and hold AS/RS (12) whichprovides temporary buffer storage fororders that are ready to ship beforethe customer is ready to pick them up.Once those orders have been clearedfor pickup and delivery, they are conveyedto the shipping area (10) andloaded onto a trailer. M20 D e c e m b e r 2 0 1 1 / Modern Materials Handling mmh.com