Comments on: Task Interleaving: An Advanced Warehouse Productivity Practice http://logisticsviewpoints.com/2009/10/29/task-interleaving-an-advanced-warehouse-productivity-practice/ Providing logistics professionals with clear and concise analyses of Logistics Trends, Technologies, and Services Tue, 27 Jul 2010 22:19:14 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.0 By: rgifford http://logisticsviewpoints.com/2009/10/29/task-interleaving-an-advanced-warehouse-productivity-practice/comment-page-1/#comment-111 rgifford Thu, 29 Oct 2009 19:05:17 +0000 http://logisticsviewpoints.com/?p=2132#comment-111 Steve, I am somewhat surprised at your observations. Interleaving capabilities have been around for a long time. As part of a WMS project I helped implement at a major Food/Beverage company, we implemented interleaving from the beginning. This was approx 1994. The operational environment was full pallet/loose case, which I believe lends itself to interleaving more than a piece/pick/pack environment might. So I am surprised that many companies have not leveraged these capabilities, at least yet. While I cannot provide ROI insight on using interleaving, we did experience significant productivity gains as the operators reduced their empty drive times, as pointed out in your posting. As a side benefit of interleaving, operators were able to handle two pallets at a time. So not only did interleaving improve productivity, the ability to move 2 pallets at a time manifested itself in the productivity improvements we experienced. I suggest that a company implementing a WMS give serious consideration to incorporating interleaving as part of the initial implementation. My experience indicates acceptance of interleaving best practices is best achieved when operational processes are designed from the beginning to leverage interleaving vs. as an afterthought. Rod Gifford Sterling Commerce Steve, I am somewhat surprised at your observations. Interleaving capabilities have been around for a long time. As part of a WMS project I helped implement at a major Food/Beverage company, we implemented interleaving from the beginning. This was approx 1994. The operational environment was full pallet/loose case, which I believe lends itself to interleaving more than a piece/pick/pack environment might.

So I am surprised that many companies have not leveraged these capabilities, at least yet. While I cannot provide ROI insight on using interleaving, we did experience significant productivity gains as the operators reduced their empty drive times, as pointed out in your posting. As a side benefit of interleaving, operators were able to handle two pallets at a time. So not only did interleaving improve productivity, the ability to move 2 pallets at a time manifested itself in the productivity improvements we experienced.

I suggest that a company implementing a WMS give serious consideration to incorporating interleaving as part of the initial implementation. My experience indicates acceptance of interleaving best practices is best achieved when operational processes are designed from the beginning to leverage interleaving vs. as an afterthought.

Rod Gifford
Sterling Commerce

]]>