business during the back-to-school and holiday seasons. “Weekly receipt projections can range from 300,000 to 3.7 million units, combined with weekly replen- ishment projections that may expand from 100,000 to 1.2 million units,” Patel says. One challenge these num- bers pose is that no matter how high the volume climbs, the DC’s convey- ors and sorters can only handle a fixed amount of product per hour. To move the record-breaking volume that passed through Warrendale dur- ing the most recent holiday and early spring seasons, Patel looked at the receipt and replenishment plans and
sharpened his figurative pencil. “I backtracked from the plan, then crunched the numbers,” he explains. “I had to determine how much we could pick, pack, and receive, respectively, per hour.” Then, given the maximum materials handling capacity, Patel looked for cre- ative ways to reach AE’s targets. ROCKING AROUND THE CLOCK “To meet the demand, I had to buy more capacity; more time to ship products out,” Patel says. That meant extending the first shift by two hours and 45 minutes. His counterpart on the second shift used a similar tactic,
so together they kept the DC work- ing practically around the clock. They also called in a cavalry of temporary workers. “The trick is to use as many resources as possible to meet volume goals,” Patel says. In the two years since AE created his current position, Patel has seen the DC’s departments learn to share resources for the common good as they never had in the past. “Before, it was challenging to get all the supervisors to work as one team,” he says. Now, they are starting to embrace Patel’s philosophy of taking an eagle’s-eye view of business. ■
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