Tips to Ensure Your Warehouse is Ready for Christmas

9 December 2019

With the holiday season creeping up on us, if you haven’t began planning for the ramp-up in business, you should start now! We have developed a list of tips to prepare your warehouse for the holiday rush while maintaining a safe workplace.

Some companies, especially in the retail sector, can do up to 50 per cent of their business in the last quarter of the year – with much of this condensed into the month of December. Locating and shipping out inventory as quickly as possible is often the priority at this time, so it isn’t a surprise that WorkSafe reports a dramatic increase in workplace injuries over November and December each year.

We have developed a list of tips to prepare your warehouse for the holiday rush while maintaining a safe workplace.

Optimise/Organise Warehouse:

It is essential to conduct a comprehensive review of your warehouse layout before the peak period each year. Do you have enough space to accommodate the additional product arriving and leaving your warehouse? You should focus on:

• Overall product organisation
• Flow of goods
• Total storage capacity
• Increasing the utility of space

Material Handling Improvements:

The volume of stock passing through your warehouse will be much higher than usual, and any pinch points in your operations will be exposed. Additionally, much of this stock may be delivered to your warehouse weeks or even months in advance and must be stored before the rush. You need to take your specific warehouse into consideration and see if any elements can be improved.

Installing material handling improvements such as mezzanine floors or conveyor systems not only improve safety, but also increase efficiency and storage space. Having systems in place such as backup power, scanners, vehicles and other equipment your warehouse relies on in case of failures in essential over this period.

Order Projections:

You know there is going to be an increased demand for your stock, but how large demand should you prepare for? You should be reviewing your previous years' sales reports and latest order flow projections from your sales and marketing teams to gain an insight into what may be coming for this peak period.

Prepare your Temporary Workforce:

Armed with your projections for the upcoming peak season, you should be in contact with recruitment agencies specialising in warehousing to strengthen your workforce if needed. Based on current sales projections and warehouse scheduling, you can estimate the increase in staff needed.

Warehouse Maintenance:

Your ability to handle a surge in business is dependent upon your equipment working and being functional. Having qualified rack inspectors assess your current pallet racking as well as having all your equipment serviced to reduce any potential downtown or shutdowns over the peak period is suggested.

There is a lot to do to prepare your warehouse for the holiday season. Following these tips should help get your warehouse prepared for a successful peak season. After the holiday rush is over, make note of what you did and what you learned so you can make the process easier next year.