How are your items arranged in your stockroom or warehouse? If you have a typical warehouse or stockroom, everything is arranged in order by part number. So, it’s easy to find everything, right?
That’s great in the beginning, but as you add new items, increasing the number of items you store, and add new items that are ‘between’ two existing item numbers, then you begin to run out of room, are forced to rearrange item locations, and things start to get a little messy.
Take a look at your shelving storage area now.
If you use bins for storage of small items, look inside the bins. Do you see a lot of space in the bins? Do you see a lot of space above the bins or boxed items before the next shelf starts? Do you have larger and smaller items next to each other on the same shelf? These are all signs that you can save space and increase efficiency in your storage area.
Now, consider storing parts by size, rather than in part number order, and you will maximize space utilization. Yes, we hear you… “But we’ve been doing it this way for years. How will anyone find anything if we change the order?” Trust us, there are ways to reorganize that will recover unused space and will still provide simple, logical and understandable location of all your items.
Efficient parts storage begins with analyzing your product mix by size. Once you have an idea of what are small, medium, and large items (whatever that means in your business), you can begin to design a layout that will work more efficiently. Grouping small items in modular drawers or on tightly spaced shelves will save an enormous amount of space. This will leave space for more of the larger items grouped on shelves spaced further apart.
Your storage will be more efficient, you will use less space and find it faster and easier to pick orders.
For more ideas on how to keep track of all these changed locations and find your products easily, check out the second post in this series.
Innovo Storage Systems 1 Goldsmith St, Johnston, RI 02919 (401) 383-0883