Last week, ES3 and nearly 20 more Partners and/or industry friends toured Amazon’s Chattanooga fulfillment centers. This facility stores small and medium sortable items; basically any item that can fit into one of Amazon’s bright yellow totes. Product is unloaded, and cases are emptied into totes for “stowing,” or put-away in the 1.2 million sq. ft. distribution center. Items are put away using Amazon’s chaotic storage method, meaning items can be stowed anywhere there is an empty spot on the shelf. Eliminating slotting, according to the chaotic school of thought, increases utilization and reduces error rates.
After watching product get stowed, our tour group shifted over to the pick side of the operation, and watched associates remove items from their storage location, filling up totes. The full totes were sent upstairs to packing stations, where associates assembled and packed boxes at lightening speed. Machines dispensed the right amount of tape for the box size, cutting down on waste. Packages and boxes of all sizes whizzed around on the conveyor belts, riding the lines straight into trucks. The facility was a sea of productivity, inbounding product and spitting out orders in a constant hum.
If you’re interesting on going on a similar tour with ES3 in the future, please let us know in the comments below, or by emailing us at blog@es3.com.