There’s one sentence which may be preventing your materials handling operation from reaching its full potential – “that’s the way we’ve always done it.”
When you’re working in a busy environment every day, under pressure to keep staff happy and meet targets, there’s often no time to sit down and really think about the small things that could be improved. And when you’ve worked in a certain environment for long enough, perhaps we just don’t see the areas for improvement that could be impacting upon the operation.
When the decision has been made to make improvements, it’s common for businesses to look at major, large-scale changes with a significant return on investment. When fixing the smaller challenges, we face on a day-to-day basis, this would also contribute to the overall profitability of the organization, the phrase “look after the pennies and pounds will take care of themselves” springs to mind.
Unfortunately, it’s hard to spot these problem areas on your own. However, obtaining a fresh perspective on the operation may help to reveal them.
One common cost-reduction measure often suggested by UniCarriers representatives is in the charging area. Charging cables damaged by trucks running over, meaning trucks can’t be charged overnight, and may not last a full shift the next day. A simple solution is retractor cables – these use pulleys mounted above the chargers, which lift the charging cable off the floor when they are not in use. This is a minor, inexpensive adjustment. But even if it saves a cable from damage once, it has already paid for itself by reducing downtime.
Small adjustments can be made to ways of working as well. For example, in an order picking operation where most of the picking is done from ground level, reach trucks may be used to lift a pallet down from higher levels, so it can be picked from before being placed back in the rack. This process is time-consuming and may require two operatives. Instead, a high-level order picker could be used, allowing the picker to reach higher pallets without the aid of a reach truck. Again, the new order picker isn’t free – but the operation would quickly attain a cost reduction through higher productivity and more efficient use of labour.
By allowing someone from outside your operation to examine it and find its pressure points, you may find improvements that don’t initially jump out but with a simple solution could make big financial savings at the same time. Maybe your New Year’s resolution is to discover the hidden potential areas in your own operation, resulting in reduction of costs, as well as improving efficiency. Something to think about in 2022.
unicarrierseurope.com/uk/improve-efficiency
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