Preparing Your Packing Center For Black Friday 25.8.2020 | Carissa Harris

What do the most successful facilities do to keep up with the increased volume of orders that they need to pack and ship during the holiday rush? While we previously wrote on how to approach Black Friday 2020 specifically, one secret is applicable every single year: focus on creating workspaces that promote lean principles while ensuring that workers are comfortable enough to operate at high levels of efficiency for extended periods of time.

The Importance of Lean Principles During High Volume Periods

The design and goal of the lean process are to improve efficiency and reduce waste in facilities that perform highly repetitive tasks, like those in packing and shipping. If there is even a little waste in a process or a physical setup, it can add up for your workspace quickly. The only way to keep on top of the enormous increase in demand that the holiday season brings is to ensure that you design your facility and processes with lean principles in mind for Black Friday.

There are seven kinds of waste that lean process targets:

• Unnecessary transportation
• Standing inventory
• Unnecessary movement
• Waiting
• Overproduction
• Over-processing
• Defects

By reducing any of these types of waste in both process or workspace, the benefits can rapidly turn into savings. Imagine being able to shave even one second off a process. Now multiply that by the vast amount of orders processed during the holiday rush. The time saved adds up quickly and can make a big impact on your bottom line. Treston designs its furniture to support these principles in high-tempo, high-efficiency facilities.

By outfitting your workstations with modular workbenches and mobile carts and worksurfaces, you can improve the efficiency of each step of your process and better connect them.

The Importance of Modularity

Since the holidays are the busiest time of the year, buying modular equipment allows you to continue making the most of your during normal demand volumes. Treston’s modular equipment is designed to allow for workstations to change as needs change. Multi-channel distribution centers and fulfillment centers around the world have found success by working with the experts at Treston to create custom workbenches for their specific needs. We’ve partnered with brands like the Ascena Retail Group and Christie’s to help them meet their demands. You can customize workstations with various types of storage accessories and complimented with carts and mobile work surfaces to improve the overall flow of processes.

E-commerce giant Bol.com equipped their new logistics warehouse in the Netherlands using Treston furniture. Lisanne Broer-van Abeelen, Lead Business Analyst/ Project Manager at bol.com said in an interview that “the two most important goals were ergonomics and efficiency. This we have reached by using the Treston solutions.”

The Ergonomics of Black Friday

The more comfortable a worker is, the more accurate they will be and the longer they’ll be able to work. Therefore, the most successful operations put such a heavy emphasis on ergonomics in order to provide workers with comfort and overall happiness. You should set up workstations with ergonomic work zones in mind and should include comfortable chairs. Together, these will allow workers to be more consistent over longer periods of time.

Increase Packing and Shipping Efficiency with the Help of Treston

New problems call for new solutions. Operating a successful packing facility while promoting the safety of workers poses its own set of unique requirements. Our mobile work surfaces and carts are easy to clean and maneuver, making sanitation faster and easier to keep your workers safe.

Approach every upcoming holiday season with confidence and proper preparations. Contact our experts today to equip your facility with the furniture that will help you increase efficiency, improve accuracy, and save money for Black Friday. If you want to get a head start and begin designing your customized workspace, use our free online 3D Configurator tool in order to both visualize and document the furniture and products you need to implement the lean process in your workspace.