Emphasis on Accuracy and Efficiency

Mouser's global corporate headquarters is located in Mansfield, TX, USA, and spans over 492,000 sq. ft. Inside are the company's chief offices, its call and data centers, as well as a state-of-the-art warehouse utilizing a wireless management system optimized for pick-and-ship operations. These capabilities and an efficient order fulfillment process allows for fast delivery with same-day shipping on most orders received by 8 p.m. CST.

In any warehousing operation you have to be an expert in getting products in and out. And in the electronics business, not known for operating with the profit margins of, say, a precious stones jeweler, it is particularly important to understand where you are, and where you could be with reconfigurations, tweaks, and innovations that others are using to improve your order-handling efficiency. Change is constant, and the most visible change in the Mouser warehouse is that it is expanding vertically via a new mezzanine “second story.” In all, the company has added 75,000 square feet of mezzanine structure with more to come; as a result of pre-planning, existing racks were manufactured with vertical expansion in mind: side flanges are already in place for future support beams. In the older sections of the warehouse you will still see bulk racks and wave machines going up and down for stocking, but these are giving way to the two- story structures.

Carousel assemblies, now accounting for 25% of the picks in the entire building, are another recent innovation. Using carousels, operators can do about 30% more than people on the floor; while one side is spinning, a pick can be already on the other side waiting for the operator. The newest sections actually have shorter carousels on top of each other with two operators basically on the same footprint.

Also contributing to a boost in efficiency is the fact that, unlike the areas using lift tables, operators can pull more parts because they are not spending time going up and down. While in theory one would be tempted to replace all the lifts with carousels, it turns out not to be necessarily cost effective to do; the increase in efficiency it would bring is not sufficient to overcome the additional cost of removing existing equipment. As a result, the carousels have been placed in areas where the removal/replacement cost of existing machinery is not a factor.

Even though order pullers are only pulling lines in the most efficient way—the overall scheme is designed to get them to walk up and down an aisle in a straight path as much as possible in order to reduce stepsthe carousels further reduce the amount of walking a pick operator has to do during the course of a given day. This has two advantages. First, any time a picker has to leave his/her workstation, it opens up the potential of losing and having to regain focus, and this increases the possibility of someone making a mistake. Second, since walking around on concrete for seven and a half hours a day can become physically draining, being less worn out also contributes to higher quality levels.

Of the approximately 343 people in the warehouse, more than half are order pullers, coordinators, inspectors — all working together to ensure accuracy.

So, is all of this activity and investment working? Given that the facility reports a 99.87% order accuracy rate, yes, you would have to say so. ■

By Murray Slovick