Sunny Europe Manages Complex Order Picking Workflows
Sunny Europe provides tax-exempt goods to outlets in Belgium, Denmark and the Netherlands, primarily in maritime and diplomatic locations but domestic areas as well. The company handles the products typically found in a duty-free shop: alcohol, watches, clothing, cigarettes, food and perfume, receiving the items from manufacturers and then deploying them to their outlets.
Problem
Sunny Europe had a complex operation of receiving and distributing items of varying sizes and values. As it grew, it had trouble matching the operational requirements with a manual storage system.
Solution
The company bought eight Modula vertical lift modules to handle both the flow of goods into its warehouse as well as shipments out of it. The automated storage units were connected to the rest of the warehouse with both elaborate conveyor-belt routes and with digital connections through the Modula warehouse management system (WMS) solution. As a result, productivity jumped from 35 lines an hour in the manual system to 150 or 220 lines an hour, depending on the complexity of the order. Altogether, Sunny Europe can manage 3,000 lines a day with close to zero mispicks.
