Mark Andy Print Products has relocated to a new lean warehouse in Earth City, Missouri, providing synergies by being closer to Mark Andy’s global headquarters and creating cost benefits for customers.
The supplies and consumables division of press manufacturer Mark Andy is now located at 4301 Rider Trail North, Suite 500, Earth City, Missouri. The move is part of a long-term strategy to be closer to Mark Andy’s global headquarters, which is located in Chesterfield, Missouri, and in a central location that facilitates logistics and supply chain management, while meeting customers’ and vendors’ needs for efficient operations and quick response shipping.
Dave Telken, vice president, Mark Andy Print Products, said, ‘In addition, we are now in a central location that can reach out customers faster. We can ship to South Texas, the East Coast, and Denver in two days.’
He continued, ‘The most significant advantage is that Mark Andy Print Products now benefits from a lean warehouse design. In an effort to continue to offer our customers the most competitive pricing in the market, we must control and minimise our operating costs. We chose to implement lean principles to help us minimise operational costs that will be reflected in the final price to our customers.’
To deliver these lean principles, experts specialising in lean warehouse management were hired and who analysed all of the company’s warehouse processes. This included spaghetti mapping the warehouse process flow – receiving, putaway, pick, pack and ship –, documenting every process, reviewing all sales transactions to understand the velocity of each product offering, and measuring over 40,000 different products to understand all the dimensional variations.
‘Once we collected this data, we had a clear picture of how we could reduce inefficiencies while maximizing labour productivity and capacity,’ said Mr Telken. ‘Then, we planned the physical product relocation from Des Plaines to the new lean warehouse in Earth City without disrupting our customers.’
Mark Andy Print Products’ new warehouse is also designed with future growth in mind. The building covers 66,000sqft and is strategically located in Earth City, the main distribution corridor in the St. Louis area. It features LED lighting, has an open floor plan with minimal columns, includes 10 dock doors, with seismic-rated racking installed and 33ft-tall ceilings that allow maximum storage with minimal floor space square footage.
‘We are very excited that our lean warehouse will allow us to operate with maximum efficiency and velocity of product flowing in and out of the building,’ concluded Telken.
