• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar

Reusable Packaging News

Pallet and reusable packaging news, resources and suppliers

Shuert Industries
  • Pallet and Container Playbook
  • Pallets 101
    • PLASTIC PALLET VENDORS
      • CORRUGATED PALLET VENDORS
    • IBC/Bulk Container Suppliers
      • PALLET PACK VENDORS
      • IBC/BULK CONTAINER GUIDE 2019
      • IBC/BULK CONTAINER POOLERS
  • Reusable Packaging 101
  • About Us
    • PRIVACY POLICY: REUSABLE PACKAGING NEWS
    • ADVERTISING & PARTNERSHIP INFORMATION
    • SUBMISSIONS
  • Español
You are here: Home / Featured Articles / How COVID-19 Has Impacted Warehouse Efficiency During the Global Pandemic

How COVID-19 Has Impacted Warehouse Efficiency During the Global Pandemic

February 8, 2021 By Rick LeBlanc

Warehousing is just one of the many industries that has been impacted by coronavirus. Despite the devastation the pandemic is wreaking across the world, we are adapting and overcoming every challenge we face.

It’s always a shame to have changes forced upon us by negative events but some of those changes are for the better. They are also likely to last much longer than the pandemic itself.

We think the following changes to warehousing brought on by the pandemic should make warehousing stronger than ever going forward.

Contents

  • 1 Larger Inventories
  • 2 Increased Automation
  • 3 Conveyor Systems
  • 4 Decentralized Warehousing
  • 5 Significant Rise in 3PL Partnerships
  • 6 Omni-channel Distribution
  • 7 Better Inventory Tracking
  • 8 Onshoring
  • 9 Better Contingency Planning
  • 10 Closer Relationships Between Warehouses and Customers

Larger Inventories

Just in time deliveries and lean manufacturing are all very well but even the smallest interruption within the supply chain can impact production. The increase in inventory we have seen across warehousing during 2020 alleviated many of these interruptions.

While holding inventory can be expensive, it prevents interruption to production which is often much more expensive to contend with.

Increased Automation

Some warehouses embraced automation as soon as it became viable. Others were a little more reticent. We have seen significant uptake in autonomous technology over the past year.

Whether it’s robots or automated storage and retrieval systems (ASRS), more warehouses than ever have been actively exploring automation and we think that will continue well into the future.

Conveyor Systems

Conveyor systems are nothing new but more warehouses are making use of them for efficiency and to reduce manpower requirements. This has obvious benefits during a pandemic and going forward once things recover.

Used in conjunction with simple but effective Euro stacking containers, conveyors are a relatively low cost, easy to maintain solution for efficient movement of goods in a warehouse.

Decentralized Warehousing

There is an obvious benefit with having large, well-staffed and equipped warehouses as a central hub. But there are also downsides. Staff shortages, shipping problems and even simple interruptions with picking and packing can have a detrimental effect further down the chain.

We are seeing more, smaller warehouses being planned and developed to help manage that. They will be less prone to significant issues and, if planned correctly, should have overlapping coverage with other warehouses to pick up the workload should something happen.

Significant Rise in 3PL Partnerships

We have seen a gradual increase in 3PL partnerships over the past couple of decades but there has been an acceleration of late. Whether that’s to streamline an operation or take advantage of decentralized or automated warehousing, using third parties for storage and transportation will continue apace.

There are downsides to 3PL partnerships but for now, at least, the benefits far outweigh the costs, especially if you’re one of the lucky few scaling up manufacturing to meet demand.

Omni-channel Distribution

It wasn’t just the pandemic that increased the appetite for omnichannel distribution. The rise and rise of eCommerce also contributed to it. From picking and packing, shipping to business customers, or shipping to end customers, warehouses have had to adapt to a changing model for supply.

Coronavirus has seen the growth of eCommerce explode with more online stores opening and existing stores doing a lot more business. While the rate of growth may slow after the pandemic, online is the future of retail.

Better Inventory Tracking

We have also seen an increased demand from retailers and manufacturers for much better tracking of inventory. They want to know what’s in stock, what’s on order, when new stock is arriving, and have a much clearer picture of the overall stock situation.

Recent events with computer component shortages are just one of many situations that have driven consumers and businesses to want to know much more about product availability.

We see this trend spreading throughout the industry and continuing long into the future.

Onshoring

Onshoring, nearshoring, reshoring, call it what you will, we see the return of manufacturing and warehousing returning home. It wasn’t just the pandemic but a combination of factors behind this move.

Higher wages in Asia, higher transport costs, delays in shipping, manpower shortages, increased fuel prices and other influences are driving a move towards bringing warehousing home, or closer to the manufacturers they supply to minimize costs and delays.

Better Contingency Planning

Warehousing has always been at the forefront of planning for its own benefit and the benefit of the business it supplies. The rise in demand and the supply chain challenges we have faced over the past year has highlighted the need for better flexibility and planning from the industry.

Planning for excess inventory, abandoned production, paused production, inventory shortages, manpower shortages and other situations will all have to be thought out much more clearly. They also have to be communicated more clearly with customers.

Closer Relationships Between Warehouses and Customers

We have strong, close relationships with some customers but remote, purely transactional relationships with others. We foresee future relationships to be closer going forward.

Warehousing will need more from customers and customers will need more from their suppliers. That demands a closer relationship between the two to facilitate this way of working.

It’s a real shame that it takes a global pandemic to push our industry so far forward so quickly. Yet here we are.

The good news is that these changes can be taken further forward after the pandemic to drive innovation and efficiency and transform warehousing so it can better meet the challenges of tomorrow!

Filed Under: Featured Articles

Primary Sidebar

JOIN OUR NEWSLETTER

Shuert
Orbis
CONPearl
https://reuseabletranspack.com
Schaefer
RPPContainers.com
FreshWater-Marketing.com
SolarPowerSystems.org
Litco.com

SEARCH

Categories

Archives

COPYRIGHT © 2023 PACKAGINGREVOLUTION.NET · Log in