To LCS the refurbishment of the warehouse at the headquarters of one of the oldest woolen mills in the world. Elegance cannot be separated from the quality of the warehouse and its handling operations.
The wool business of the Barberis Canonico family began in 1663 in Pratrivero, in the province of Biella, from where it has never moved, building generation after generation (they are now at the fourteenth!) one of the first companies in the world to produce fabrics. In 2013 the company became part of the prestigious international club reserved for family businesses with at least two hundred years of history, Les Hénokiens.
For its prestigious production, the company has about 500 employees in 2 plants in the Biella area: in the historical site in Pratrivero and in the detached production unit in Pray. In 2017 the wool mill produced over 10 million metres of fabric with over 3,000 variations.
Such a production requires a perfect warehouse. Customers order the pieces of fabric for sartorial production almost just-in-time and the supply must be perfect and timely.
Vitale Barberis Canonico is constantly seeking to improve its customer service and already back in 2017 the analysis for a structural change to the automatic yarn warehouse had begun.
Vitale Barberis Canonico has analyzed with LCS the best solutions to respond to a whole series of needs related to production and the target market.
With its structural and software interventions, LCS has successfully met the need to increase storage capacity. At the same time, LCS has improved the efficiency of serving the semi-finished yarn to the warping and weaving departments and refined the picking process. Today, the warehouse as a whole is more productive, effective and efficient to meet the growing needs of customers.
The technological refurbishment of the warehouse has also led to greater control over the product as well as guaranteeing greater safety for operators at the state of the art.
The redefinition of the flows has solved the congestion in the areas of goods handling and has made the flow in the warehouse of the headquarters of Vitale Barberis-Canonico consistent with the needs of extreme service required by the international customers of the wool mill.
In order to achieve the goals set by the customer, LCS has intensified the automation of the warehouse by installing two additional stacker cranes, bringing the total to five. Overall performance has thus increased by 85%, from 150 UdC/hour to 280 UdC/hour.
In addition, LCS has tripled its performance in conveyor transport from 80 to 240 UdC/hour and has obtained more picking bays during the refurbishment intervention.
Thanks to the partnership with LCS, Vitale Barberis-Canonico can now count on a more efficient and productive warehouse to deal more effectively with the requests for high-end fabrics of demanding international customers.
Article published in “Sole 24 Ore – 30th January – Supplement intralogistics”
