Case Study
Customer Profile
Industry
Non-Profit relief Agency
Product
OpenWMS
Technology Expands Food Bank's
Reach
Many Americans are struggling to
make ends meet today. Organizations like the Food Bank For New York City are
being challenged to extend a helping hand to as many people as possible.
The largest food bank in the
country and leading distributor of free fresh produce, the Food Bank For New
York City provides 67 million pounds of food annually to more than 1,100
nonprofit community food programs in the Bronx, Brooklyn, Manhattan, Queens and
Staten Island -- that means 240,000 meals a day for New Yorkers who would
otherwise go hungry. It also means a 100,000-square-foot warehouse with a
tremendous amount of movement and workers who have a critical need to know where
every item is every minute of the day.
To better handle this important
task, the Food Bank needed to replace its largely paper-based tracking system,
where physical inventories were done manually and adjustments key entered into
the system. "It was not an instant system," says Antonio Peralta, Director of IT
for the Food Bank For New York City. That, plus lost paperwork and inaccuracies,
led Food Bank management to search for something that would help them better
manage their inventory and better serve the citizens who relied on their
services.
Solution found just around the
corner
The Food Bank created a two-person
team comprised of Carlos Linares and Tyrone Harrysingh to research possible
solutions. The team discovered the food bank in nearby Krasdale had installed a
system to tackle the same challenges the Food Bank For New York City was facing.
The application implemented at Krasdale featured hand-held
terminals, bar code scanning and the
Open
Warehouse Management System (OpenWMS®) from
Compsee (www.compsee.com).
The flexible OpenWMS is a real-time system, with sophisticated receiving,
directed putaway and picking features. Guillermo Fisher, the distribution center
manager at Krasdale, told the project team about the application.
"We found that the price was
within our range, and we heard a lot of good things about it, so we decided to
go with it," says Peralta.
Integrator Compsee came out to the
Food Bank facility to spec out the system and do a site survey to establish
where access points would be needed for radio communications between the host
system, hand-held terminals and forklift-mounted terminals workers used as they
roamed the sprawling warehouse. Plans also needed to include a connection to
Microsoft's Navision Financial System that Food Bank management planned to
implement. The WMS was installed in 2002, and the financial end was connected in
2004.
Efficient from the start
The process starts when packaged
food is received into the dock, which can handle daily deliveries from up to 12
tractor-trailer trucks. OpenWMS is used to receive the food there. Workers use
the hand helds, HHP Dolphin 7200s (older hardware being slowly upgraded) and HHP
Dolphin 9500s, to enter all the food by batch, since there is currently no
wireless access point at the dock. Workers then move the foodstuffs on hi-lo
forklifts to their warehouse locations, using their mounted Intelligent
Instrumentation CE terminals with PSC PowerScan tethered scanners to read the
bin bar code (all are Code 39) and record the exact location in the system. DAP
9800 rugged hand-held terminals are used in the large walk-in freezer. Then the
food waits, on pallets stacked 35 feet high, to be repacked to fill orders for
organizations which provide the food to the hungry.
When an order is taken through
Navision, also called CERES, it gets sent to the WMS database for transfer into
the hand helds. The Logistics department prints out bar-coded pick lists, which
are sent to the warehouse supervisor, who distributes them to workers. The
workers take the pick list and head out to the bins with confidence, having
scanned the bar code on the list to get the exact location of what they need.
For each item/pallet picked, workers scan the pallet bar code and enter the
amount on their terminal so the system can keep track of their work.
When the last item is scanned, the
system displays "Order complete" on the terminal to verify picking is done
correctly. Workers then send that information back to the host running Windows
SQL Standard 2000. The host shares it with the financial system, which invoices
the order and adjusts the inventory.
(Ed. Note: Compsee has since
upgraded the operating system to Windows 2003 Server 64 Bit, and the database to
SQL Server 2005.)
Storage amounts impact access
points
As usually happens with
implementations, a few bugs had to be worked out of the new system. Though it
started out with five access points, the Food Bank ended up needing three more,
for a total of eight. "Compsee did the site survey when the warehouse wasn't so
full," notes Peralta. "With more food stored, we found we needed more access
points to work around the interference caused by the stacked food."
It was a vexing problem that took
a while to solve. "I wish we had done more research on site surveys. I think we
could have figured out the problem sooner," he says, adding Compsee was very
responsive and worked hard to address every concern.
Peralta also needed to adjust the
way users accessed and updated data. "It's an open system, which is great, but
that meant anyone could go directly into the tables, and we didn't want that,"
he says. The simple solution was to insert a graphical user interface, a form
workers fill out that updates the tables, preventing any accidental corruption.
"The adjustments were made, and
now it works great. Just the way we intended it to," he adds.
Accurate inventory affects
everything
Having a constantly updated
inventory that truly reflects what is on its shelves has had an impact on all
parts of the Food Bank, says Peralta. In the warehouse, "there's no more paper
and writing down quantities, which was very time-consuming. It's easier to
select orders -- workers know where they need to go," he says.
Because the WMS and order-taking
systems are so well-integrated, the logistics department, where orders are
processed, runs much more efficiently. "There's no paper, and they don't have to
go to the WMS front end because both systems communicate so well," says Peralta.
The system also has made a huge
difference in Agency Services, which provides customer service for all their
programs. The real-time aspect allows workers to say with conviction what they
can provide because they know for certain what is in stock. The system also
monitors product circulation so the warehouse operates on a first-in, first-out
(FIFO) basis that maximizes food use.
Finally, the IT department, "which
consists of me," laughs Peralta, "is very happy with it. It's been great." He
spends much less time troubleshooting and working to make sure everyone has the
information he or she needs. And he has much more data available. "With the old
system, we had to do physical checks to track down product, and we couldn't
backtrack as far as with this system."
A surprise benefit for Peralta was
the incredible number of reports he could produce. "We can provide lots of
detailed reports to different departments. This reporting tool allows us to make
better, more accurate and faster decisions," he says.
The Food Bank's paybacks are
inventory integrity, accuracy, better customer service, and, of course,
productivity. Now, workers conduct physical inventories three to four times
faster than before. That means more food goes out more quickly -- distribution
has increased 6 million pounds from the previous year to 67 million pounds of
food in 2004.
That doesn't mean the Food Bank is
satisfied yet. Though no changes are planned for the immediate future, Peralta
says, "We need to take full advantage of the system as it is right now. I think
we can improve how we use it." For example, new reports are always being
requested, and the older hand helds continue to be slowly upgraded.
For now, however, this is a great
improvement. "We are distributing more food to the needy," says Peralta. "That's
what it's all about."
Benefits:
-
Inventory conducted three to
four times faster
-
Accuracy increased
dramatically
-
Report capabilities and data
availability greatly enhanced
-
Money saved by blending older
hardware with new system
-
Less time spent
troubleshooting system
-
Better tracking capabilities
-
More efficient system allows
more food to be distributed to cities needy
For more
information, please contact us.
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