Narrow Aisle Flexi are recognised as a leader in the design and manufacture of articulated warehouse trucks. The company pioneered the development of Flexi VNA Warehouse Truck systems over 30 years ago and have built a global reputation for cost-effective, reliable and exceptional long-term value for money.
Managing Director at Narrow Aisle Ltd
Narrow Aisle designs and builds with only high quality reliable ‘Tier One’ sourced components across the range, which allows them to provide exceptionally high levels of aftersales parts support. The company offers technical and aftersales support through a global network of established independent distributors in over 70 countries, with hubs in Tipton, Houston and Taichung.
John Maguire, Managing Director of Narrow Aisle Ltd spoke to Warehouse & Logistics News.
What products or services does your company offer?
Since being founded in 1976, Narrow Aisle has always been a space saving warehouse truck specialist. We have designed, build and distributed a range of truck-based intralogistics solutions, but we are best known for our Flexi range of articulated warehouse trucks.
Which industries do your customers operate in and which sectors ones are growing fastest?
Our Flexi Truck has proven to be ideal for order picking mixed pallet loads, assembling full pallets of mixed product. It is especially suited to the third-party logistics and retail sectors, where products are manually picked in their supply chain every day.
Do you have any examples of a project you have recently completed?
The entire Flexi Truck range now has the state-of-the-art digital motor control system technology, allowing for the first time on any articulated warehouse truck the power steering to be run by an independent ‘brushless’ motor that saves 50% of the previous battery power drain.
What are your most recent product innovations?
We introduced the all-digital controlled models across its top-selling Flexi range of truck-based intralogistics solutions. Each Flexi Truck product is now built with energy saving ‘brushless’ motors and ‘cambus’ digital control systems. This also allows the safe use of lithium-ion battery power; the LiTHiON Flexi Truck range is proving to be of great interest to customers with many installations already working successfully.
What are the major trends and developments affecting your category and your customers, and how are you responding?
The trend towards ever higher buildings to utilise land and space better has resulted in a big increase in average lift height of Flexi Trucks new installations. The range now includes installed systems with proven full pallet lift heights of 14.5 metres here in the UK.
Can you tell us about any recent customer contract wins and how you helped the customer meet their challenges?
The number of new ‘high bay’ warehouse installations has been outstanding this year. Lift heights of 12 metres are becoming commonplace. We feel that the developments we have made in ‘cobotic’ features on the Flexi range has allowed our customers to achieve their goals in storage capacity throughput efficiency, and safe operation of these high lift height systems.
How were business levels in 2022 compared to previous years?
We were able to increase our production values. As a result, sales of Flexi Digital Trucks are at an all-time high. Due to investment in our supply chain systems and planning with our suppliers, we have been able to continue to build and deliver new Flexi Trucks with the full range of lift height specifications and model variants often in 8 to 10 weeks from the date that an order is placed.
What is your strategy for succeeding in the current climate?
Our Flexi product range is a key part of the warehouse logistics arena in the UK. We were requested to continue to operate at full capacity during all the recent supply chain difficulties. We are very proud of all our team who have worked tirelessly throughout the whole of this extended period, as well as welcoming new colleagues and helping to train new apprentices in the future.
With the ongoing political uncertainty, it is unclear what the market in 2023 might be. However, our sector of the MHE market, Intralogistics, is growing strongly on the back of demand driven by e-commerce, home delivery, e-fulfilment, and third-party warehousing. We are budgeting for a year of significant growth in demand in the UK and globally next year, especially as costs return to normal. We also expect strong growth in markets around the world, especially in the Americas where we have recently invested in additional distribution opportunities.
In what areas are you making technological advances?
Our Flexi Truck warehouse system division has developed and incorporated a number of new ‘Cobotic’ driver aid systems to stack pallets higher than ever before. Eliminating many of the worries warehouse operators have about safe handling at lift height of up to 15m was critical. Unique digitally controlled steering integrated high-definition vision systems, shelf height selectors, aisle proximity sensors and reversing sensors to aid aisle entry have all increased safe handling productivity.
What training do you provide for your staff?
We have an extensive training programme for all out staff, key areas currently are health and safety, MHE driver training, service engineering skills and MBA sponsorship. Career development is a key driver in the success of our business globally. We will continue this path in 2023.
What is the company’s commitment to social responsibility?
We have invested in young people during these difficult times. Apprenticeships in both engineering and commercial areas of the business have been created.
What improvements have you made to your customer service recently?
Out customer service investment in Scotland has been very successful with many new customers joining us. The growth in short-term rental fleets, in some cases driven by the uncertainties of the last three years, meant we needed to increase our contract management capability. This investment is now allowing us to provide fleet management information and support to all our fleet customers.
Are you helping customers boost the level of automation in their business?
Most of our customers are looking to increase productivity and save cost with appropriate investment in artificial intelligence (AI) technology. To make improvements available to more customers we have invested in a digital platform in our Flexi Truck product to allow many new ‘cobotic’ driver assist systems to be specified.
Do you help customers maximise the use of their existing warehouse space?
Our long-term experience in space saving systems means we have experienced people to help customers. The use of Computer Aided Design (CAD), pallet rack storage system designs, project planning, reconfiguration of outdated systems and full project management capability allows our customers to optimise their operations at minimum cost.
Will you be investing in your premises over the next 12 months?
Our factory site development continues, with additional projects to increase output at our Tipton site, with particular emphasis on our facilities to aid manufacturing, logistics and line feeding.
What industries do you believe offer your business the most potential over the next year?
The company has launched a scrappage scheme that gives operators of LPG-powered trucks the chance to make significant savings, should they choose to dispose of their old LPG forklifts to acquire new Flexi Truck digital models.
How future proof is your business?
Intralogistics development is the future of supply chains. We are at the heart of this industry; we believe our increasing global reach will sustain our company’s growth for many years to come.
Will you be exhibiting at any major trade shows over the next year?
In 2023 we will attend all the major events once again in the UK, (IntraLogisteX, Multimodal, Tomorrow’s Warehouse Event ect.) We will be presenting our Flexi Digital Range at the key Promat show in Chicago, USA with a renewed emphasis on India which has a burgeoning growth in intralogistics investment currently.
NARROW AISLE
0121 557 6242
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