David Maloney has been a journalist for more than 35 years and is currently the group editorial director for DC Velocity and Supply Chain Quarterly magazines. In this role, he is responsible for the editorial content of both brands of Agile Business Media. Dave joined DC Velocity in April of 2004. Prior to that, he was a senior editor for Modern Materials Handling magazine. Dave also has extensive experience as a broadcast journalist. Before writing for supply chain publications, he was a journalist, television producer and director in Pittsburgh. Dave combines a background of reporting on logistics with his video production experience to bring new opportunities to DC Velocity readers, including web videos highlighting top distribution and logistics facilities, webcasts and other cross-media projects. He continues to live and work in the Pittsburgh area.
When consumer products giant Amway decided to move its Midwest fulfillment operations to a building on its main campus in Ada, Mich., managers saw their chance for a clean sweep. From the outset, they rejected the idea of replicating the setup of the retailer's former regional facility, located just a few miles away. Instead, they would use the opportunity to redesign the fulfillment process and introduce more automation.
What prompted the move was a change in the retailer's operations. The old building had been a dual-purpose facility, used for shipping both catalog orders and orders from Amway's "Independent Business Owners," or IBOs—the local folks nationwide who market Amway products to their friends and neighbors. But the retailer had recently shut down the catalog business, making the old process obsolete. At that point, the company decided it would be better served by shifting fulfillment to a 600,000-square-foot facility that had formerly supported manufacturing.
Although the move offered an opportunity to start with a clean slate, the design team also faced some challenges. One of the big questions involved the conveyors that would be used to whisk items through the facility (95 percent of Amway's products are conveyable). The company was hoping to improve on the system at the old facility, which had featured eight miles of conveyor belt. In particular, it was looking for units that would be quieter and more energy-efficient than their predecessors. It also wanted models that would provide better accumulation and gapping.
There were other requirements as well. The system would have to be capable of accommodating wide fluctuations in volume. Amway's orders rise sharply during the last week of each month, as its IBOs push to meet their goals. During peak periods, as many as 24,000 cartons move through the facility each day. That number is expected to jump to well over 30,000 when the full ramp-up is completed.
Then there was the matter of wide variations in product weights and sizes. Since its founding in 1959 as a seller of household cleaners, Amway has expanded and diversified into such product lines as nutritional supplements, jewelry and accessories, and health and beauty aids. That meant the conveyors selected would have to be capable of transporting anything from an empty carton weighing a few ounces up to an order weighing 50 pounds.
ON A ROLL
With the help of Bastian Solutions, a systems design and integration firm that also acts as a distributor for Hytrol Conveyor Co., Amway found the solution it was seeking. The system the two partners came up with features not just one type of conveyor, but a combination of roller, belt, spiral, curved, incline, gravity, accumulating, and trash conveyors that serve just about every area of the DC. The conveyors in the new system, most of which were supplied by Hytrol, are equally capable of gently handling a big box of dog food as a carton containing a single tube of lipstick.
"We have a wide range of conveyors. There is a purpose behind every type," explains Paul Slack, senior engineer. "Within a line, we go smoothly from one type to another—whatever is best to do the job."
Rollers are employed for basic transport in this extensive network (there are over 400,000 total rollers found within the system's conveyors). Belt conveyors are used in areas for accumulating, weighing, and scanning, among others. The system has 36 scanners arrayed along its various paths.
Among the workhorses of the system are Hytrol's E24 modular conveyors, which provide zero pressure accumulation and gapping with the added benefit of plug-and-play connectivity. That makes them easy to install and later reconfigure. Their 24-volt design also provides efficient, quiet operation. Rollers shut down when there is no product present to convey.
JUST SKIP IT
Another benefit of Amway's new conveyor design is that it can accommodate zone skipping. In the old building, orders had to pass through all pick zones whether the zones contained items needed for the order or not. In the new facility, that's no longer necessary. Under the current setup, the facility's RedPrairie warehouse management system is able to route cartons so they bypass zones that do not contain any picks.
The conveyors serve a pick-to-belt area, where full cases are selected; a split case area; and a pick-to-combine area, where small-carton items and split-case items are consolidated into a single outbound carton to save on shipping. Picking in these areas is directed by a combination of pick-to-light and pick-by-voice technologies, with both systems supplied by Bastian.
DIVERSIONARY TACTICS
Bastian also provided several ZIPline zero pressure accumulation conveyors that feature a "tacky," or rough-surfaced, belt that allows for quick acceleration and deceleration without product slippage. These are deployed in areas where product is to be inserted or diverted. In all, the system at Amway features 51 total conveyor diverts.
Among those diverts is a section that feeds three French-made packaging systems from B+ Equipment and its American partner, Sealed Air Corp. These machines "right size" cartons by folding down the top edges to meet the height of the tallest item in the carton. The system then glues a lid onto the box.
In addition to routing items to the various picking areas, the conveyors also serve document insertion areas, the print-and-apply applicators, and the packaging area. In-line scales built into the conveyors also perform weight verification at several stages along the conveyor journey to assure that true weight matches expected weight.
Once all products have been packaged, the cartons enter a 4-to-1 sawtooth merge that lines them up for sorting via a narrow-belt sorter. Wheels at the 16 diverts pop up at a 30-degree angle between the conveying bands of the sorter to nudge products down spurs to awaiting docks. This unit is able to sort 90 cartons a minute, serving four pallet build areas and 12 shipping lanes. Cartons are floor loaded onto trailers aided by a telescoping extendible conveyor supplied by Adjustoveyor.
Editor's note: The facility described in this story is featured in "Move it!," a new Web-based TV series that takes viewers inside the operations of leading companies and introduces them to the people, cutting-edge technologies, and strategies that make it all work. To view the episode and see Amway's conveyors in action, visit www.moveitshow.com.
Nearly one-third of American consumers have increased their secondhand purchases in the past year, revealing a jump in “recommerce” according to a buyer survey from ShipStation, a provider of web-based shipping and order fulfillment solutions.
The number comes from a survey of 500 U.S. consumers showing that nearly one in four (23%) Americans lack confidence in making purchases over $200 in the next six months. Due to economic uncertainty, savvy shoppers are looking for ways to save money without sacrificing quality or style, the research found.
Younger shoppers are leading the charge in that trend, with 59% of Gen Z and 48% of Millennials buying pre-owned items weekly or monthly. That rate makes Gen Z nearly twice as likely to buy second hand compared to older generations.
The primary reason that shoppers say they have increased their recommerce habits is lower prices (74%), followed by the thrill of finding unique or rare items (38%) and getting higher quality for a lower price (28%). Only 14% of Americans cite environmental concerns as a primary reason they shop second-hand.
Despite the challenge of adjusting to the new pattern, recommerce represents a strategic opportunity for businesses to capture today’s budget-minded shoppers and foster long-term loyalty, Austin, Texas-based ShipStation said.
For example, retailers don’t have to sell used goods to capitalize on the secondhand boom. Instead, they can offer trade-in programs swapping discounts or store credit for shoppers’ old items. And they can improve product discoverability to help customers—particularly older generations—find what they’re looking for.
Other ways for retailers to connect with recommerce shoppers are to improve shipping practices. According to ShipStation:
70% of shoppers won’t return to a brand if shipping is too expensive.
51% of consumers are turned off by late deliveries
40% of shoppers won’t return to a retailer again if the packaging is bad.
The “CMA CGM Startup Awards”—created in collaboration with BFM Business and La Tribune—will identify the best innovations to accelerate its transformation, the French company said.
Specifically, the company will select the best startup among the applicants, with clear industry transformation objectives focused on environmental performance, competitiveness, and quality of life at work in each of the three areas:
Shipping: Enabling safer, more efficient, and sustainable navigation through innovative technological solutions.
Logistics: Reinventing the global supply chain with smart and sustainable logistics solutions.
Media: Transform content creation, and customer engagement with innovative media technologies and strategies.
Three winners will be selected during a final event organized on November 15 at the Orange Vélodrome Stadium in Marseille, during the 2nd Artificial Intelligence Marseille (AIM) forum organized by La Tribune and BFM Business. The selection will be made by a jury chaired by Rodolphe Saadé, Chairman and CEO of the Group, and including members of the executive committee representing the various sectors of CMA CGM.
The global air cargo market’s hot summer of double-digit demand growth continued in August with average spot rates showing their largest year-on-year jump with a 24% increase, according to the latest weekly analysis by Xeneta.
Xeneta cited two reasons to explain the increase. First, Global average air cargo spot rates reached $2.68 per kg in August due to continuing supply and demand imbalance. That came as August's global cargo supply grew at its slowest ratio in 2024 to-date at 2% year-on-year, while global cargo demand continued its double-digit growth, rising +11%.
The second reason for higher rates was an ocean-to-air shift in freight volumes due to Red Sea disruptions and e-commerce demand.
Those factors could soon be amplified as e-commerce shows continued strong growth approaching the hotly anticipated winter peak season. E-commerce and low-value goods exports from China in the first seven months of 2024 increased 30% year-on-year, including shipments to Europe and the US rising 38% and 30% growth respectively, Xeneta said.
“Typically, air cargo market performance in August tends to follow the July trend. But another month of double-digit demand growth and the strongest rate growths of the year means there was definitely no summer slack season in 2024,” Niall van de Wouw, Xeneta’s chief airfreight officer, said in a release.
“Rates we saw bottoming out in late July started picking up again in mid-August. This is too short a period to call a season. This has been a busy summer, and now we’re at the threshold of Q4, it will be interesting to see what will happen and if all the anticipation of a red-hot peak season materializes,” van de Wouw said.
The report cites data showing that there are approximately 1.7 million workers missing from the post-pandemic workforce and that 38% of small firms are unable to fill open positions. At the same time, the “skills gap” in the workforce is accelerating as automation and AI create significant shifts in how work is performed.
That information comes from the “2024 Labor Day Report” released by Littler’s Workplace Policy Institute (WPI), the firm’s government relations and public policy arm.
“We continue to see a labor shortage and an urgent need to upskill the current workforce to adapt to the new world of work,” said Michael Lotito, Littler shareholder and co-chair of WPI. “As corporate executives and business leaders look to the future, they are focused on realizing the many benefits of AI to streamline operations and guide strategic decision-making, while cultivating a talent pipeline that can support this growth.”
But while the need is clear, solutions may be complicated by public policy changes such as the upcoming U.S. general election and the proliferation of employment-related legislation at the state and local levels amid Congressional gridlock.
“We are heading into a contentious election that has already proven to be unpredictable and is poised to create even more uncertainty for employers, no matter the outcome,” Shannon Meade, WPI’s executive director, said in a release. “At the same time, the growing patchwork of state and local requirements across the U.S. is exacerbating compliance challenges for companies. That, coupled with looming changes following several Supreme Court decisions that have the potential to upend rulemaking, gives C-suite executives much to contend with in planning their workforce-related strategies.”
Stax Engineering, the venture-backed startup that provides smokestack emissions reduction services for maritime ships, will service all vessels from Toyota Motor North America Inc. visiting the Toyota Berth at the Port of Long Beach, according to a new five-year deal announced today.
Beginning in 2025 to coincide with new California Air Resources Board (CARB) standards, STAX will become the first and only emissions control provider to service roll-on/roll-off (ro-ros) vessels in the state of California, the company said.
Stax has rapidly grown since its launch in the first quarter of this year, supported in part by a $40 million funding round from investors, announced in July. It now holds exclusive service agreements at California ports including Los Angeles, Long Beach, Hueneme, Benicia, Richmond, and Oakland. The firm has also partnered with individual companies like NYK Line, Hyundai GLOVIS, Equilon Enterprises LLC d/b/a Shell Oil Products US (Shell), and now Toyota.
Stax says it offers an alternative to shore power with land- and barge-based, mobile emissions capture and control technology for shipping terminal and fleet operators without the need for retrofits.
In the case of this latest deal, the Toyota Long Beach Vehicle Distribution Center imports about 200,000 vehicles each year on ro-ro vessels. Stax will keep those ships green with its flexible exhaust capture system, which attaches to all vessel classes without modification to remove 99% of emitted particulate matter (PM) and 95% of emitted oxides of nitrogen (NOx). Over the lifetime of this new agreement with Toyota, Stax estimated the service will account for approximately 3,700 hours and more than 47 tons of emissions controlled.
“We set out to provide an emissions capture and control solution that was reliable, easily accessible, and cost-effective. As we begin to service Toyota, we’re confident that we can meet the needs of the full breadth of the maritime industry, furthering our impact on the local air quality, public health, and environment,” Mike Walker, CEO of Stax, said in a release. “Continuing to establish strong partnerships will help build momentum for and trust in our technology as we expand beyond the state of California.”