Pick and mix safely
October 1st 2008 With retailers keeping less inventory in store, the amount of break-bulk and ground level
picking of items into economic order quantities within distribution centres is growing fast.
This means warehouse designers are under increasing pressure to devise storage systems
that allow forklifts and order pickers to work alongside each other efficiently and safely,
says Narrow Aisle's John Maguire
Operator safety is a key
consideration within any materials
handling operation and with
forklift trucks implicated in around onequarter
of all serious workplace transportrelated
injuries and some ten fatalities a
year, it's easy to understand why.
Successful warehousing is always a
balance of productivity and safety, but
safety has to be the foremost
consideration. Of course, forklift truck
design has an important role to play in
safety, but so too does the design and
layout of the warehouse or distribution
centre itself.
For example, of all the processes
involved in modern warehousing, order
picking tends to be the focus of most
attention when it comes to creating a new
storage system. This is understandable as
most warehouse or distribution centre
operations process many more outgoing
orders than incoming loads and, of course,
the ability to quickly and accurately
collate picked goods is rightly regarded as
having a direct link to efficiency, costs
and, in the retail sector, customer
satisfaction,
The order picking method used at any
given site will depend on a number of
factors such as the characteristics of the
product being handled, total number of
transactions, total number of orders, picks
per order, quantity per pick, etc etc, but, in
simple terms, the vast majority of
customer order picking – especially in the
grocery, retail and consumer sectors – is
undertaken from palletized loads placed at
ground level within the pallet racking with
the reserve or bulk stock stored above.
With rental rates for warehouse
property in prime locations throughout
the UK at a near all-time high, designers
of internal logistics systems are under
pressure to make maximum use of all
available storage space within the
warehouse facility. But, while it is essential
to keep aisle widths to a minimum, at sites
where a high degree of ground level order
picking is required, it is important that
aisles are wide enough for forklifts and
order pickers to be able to work alongside
each other not only efficiently but also
safely.
From the feedback we have had from
warehouse operators, there is growing
concern that the use of traditional guided
products such as Man-Up Combis and VNA
Turret trucks can compromise order
picking efficiency and health and safety
within warehouses where there is a high
degree of low level order picking.
For example, Narrow Aisle recently
installed Flexi G4 Hi-Max articulated trucks
at Natco Foods, a wholesaler of Asian
foods. When considering the most
suitable handling system for its new
distribution centre Natco had planned to
use guided VNA Turret trucks. However,
because a high degree of ground level
order picking would take place at the site,
Natco decided that Turret trucks were not
the ideal choice as it can be difficult for
low level order picking tasks to be carried
out in narrow warehouse aisles while such
machines are also operating.
Man-up Combi trucks were another
option but were also considered a
potential risk because, in its elevated
position a Man-up Combi VNA truck might
lift the operator 10 metres in the air, but if
you have someone in the same aisle order
picking at ground level there is always the
risk of the Combi operator not seeing the
order picker below.
Natco eventually chose Flexi G4 HiMax
trucks which, because of their design, are
suited to working in narrower aisles
alongside order picking staff without
creating a health and safety issue. With
clear aisle widths of 2000mm within
Natcos distribution centre, the Flexis can
work in the same aisle as low level order
pickers safely and efficiently.
There is a discernible trend in the
mechanics of customer order picking with
more demand for smaller volumes of
outers per SKU picked more frequently.
Everyone – particularly first and second
tier retailers – wants less inventory in
store so the amount of break-bulk and
ground level picking of single items within
RDCs is growing fast. When the number
of SKUs increases the warehouse operator
needs more of those valuable ground level
picking locations to maintain efficiency
and, at the same time, maximise the use
of expensive warehouse space. Because of
its design, the articulated truck is perfectly
suited to working in narrower aisles
alongside order picking staff without
creating a health and safety issue.
Furthermore, by using articulated forklifts,
warehouse operators obtain more ground
level picking locations and increase their
overall warehouse capacity by up to 30
per cent. More articles from Narrow Aisle Flexi: | 
