The Future-Proof Warehouse Rethinking Logistics for What’s Next | Spotlight Series

This Retail Technology Spotlight series podcast is brought to you by the Omnitalk retail Podcast Network.

Hello everyone.

I am Chris Walton, your host for today's interview.

An interview in which we are going to explore the question of how do you decide when and how to upgrade your logistical network?

Because meeting today's demand while scaling for the future always brings with it strategic questions.

Questions like, do you build new facilities?

Do you upgrade existing ones?

And we're going to have this conversation through the lens of a real life case study of Southern Glaciers Wine and spirits, the premier beverage distributor for wines, spirits, beer and non alcoholic products in the US And Canada, who has led to work through these questions.

Amid all the ongoing trends surrounding alcohol consumption, as well as the challenges that come from varying state regulations, the WCS.

Provides real time visibility, so the warehouse operations leadership, they can be more proactive in how they run the operation.

We were also able to reduce our delivery frequency from five days a week to four days a week.

All the equipment and machinery that we just talked about, right, that's the hands and feet of the machine.

But the warehouse control software, that's the mind behind it.

For us, it's all about scalability.

We've built a good relationship with Domatic even.

Well, back into the Glazers days.

Volumes going up, consumption is changing,.

Large or small, new or expand.

Those are the dilemmas I'm going to explore with today's guest, Julian Sayan, a senior supply chain engineer at Southern Glazers.

Julian, welcome.

Hey, Chris, good morning.

Thank you for having us.

Yeah, I'm excited to have this conversation.

And Nick San Frani, a senior account manager at Domatic.

Nick, how are you?

Hey, Chris, I'm doing great, Happy to be here.

Thank you.

Yeah, I know.

Exciting, exciting.

So, Julian, I'm curious, you know, how long have you been in the, the alcohol and beverage business?

Yeah, so I actually started at Southern about four years ago.

Okay.

So yeah, not, not, not too long in the grand scheme of things, but about half my career I've been, I've been in the alcohol space.

Nice.

And where do we, where, where do we find you today?

Where are you?

I am in rainy and sunny South Florida, actually.

South.

South Florida.

Okay.

Gosh, I'm jealous already.

All right.

And Nick, how long, how long have you been in the logistics business?

Well, so I have been with Thematic for all of my almost 20 year career at this point, so.

Oh my God, really?

Okay, start.

I started with Dometic as an intern actually when I was in engineering school and I never left.

So I have Been here almost.

Like I said, almost 20 years now.

Yeah.

Wow.

Wow, that's impressive.

And where do you.

Where do you call home, Nick?

Yeah, so I am in the oven of Dallas, Texas right now.

So it is very, very hot.

And I'm just waiting for a break at this point.

All right, so we got Dallas, Florida and Minnesota for today's Spotlight podcast.

All right, that's a.

That's a nice little triangle we got going on there, you two.

Julian, let's start with you.

I think let's set the table.

I mentioned at the outset that we're going to do a case study on Southern Glaciers.

You know, the effort it's done to revamp its logistics network over the past few years.

And so in preparing for the conversation today, one of the things I uncovered is that Southern Glaciers has had a really interesting past 10 years, and that history partly explains why we're here having this conversation that we are today.

So can you set the table for our audience with all the background needed to understand why upgrading your logistics network became so top of mind for you all at Southern Glazers?

Yeah, so like you mentioned, 10 years ago, we had the merger between Southern and Glazers, and after that happened, you know, we went and started re evaluating our network across our 47 different sites, different markets, rather.

And, you know, in some of those markets, we did have two, three DCs, and, you know, we wanted to see how we could best support our customers and, you know, provide that value to them and to the company itself.

Right.

So we wanted to revisit our current network and see how can we best expand and scale our current network to make sure that we are able to serve our customers, you know, 20 to 30 years down the line as market trends do evolve, things have changed rapidly since 2020.

We had the pandemic.

Consumption had changed.

Right.

Everybody was.

Was drinking heavily during that time.

And then now, you know, now we've gone through the.

It's almost like a health, I guess, realization where, you know, being in shape and being healthy is.

Is at the.

The forefront of everybody's mind.

So, you know, they're the.

The consumption has changed from how they were drinking in the past versus how they're.

How they're drinking today.

Yeah, the industry's definitely seen a lot of change, particularly, particularly since the pandemic over the last 10 years, too.

Well, I'm curious, Julian.

So, like, so as you're going through that kind of analysis internally of, you know, you've combined these two entities, you've got these two Existing logistical infrastructures in place and you have to decide where to take it next in response to those trends.

So like talk us through for the audience's sake.

How do you decide what goes into deciding whether or not you're going to upgrade a facility versus maybe building a brand new facility, greenfield.

Like where are the puts and takes in that analysis?

Yeah, so, and that's a, that's a good point.

Right.

So we, you know, I'll take our, our state, Louisiana for example, where we recently did, where we did a project with, with Dematic.

You know, at the very beginning, we look at our, there in Louisiana, we had two, two DCs, we had one in St. Rose and one in Lafayette.

Right.

And we go and we look to see, okay, how are we currently serving our customers and what does that look like in the future.

Right.

Usually when we, when we start thinking about this, our, our existing DCs are already at capacity, if you will, for inventory.

You know, we're maxing out on, on cases sorted per hour and you know, there's not much room for expansion there without major distrib disruptions to our, you know, our operation.

Right.

So, you know, we, we have to take that into account when deciding, hey, do we want to be down for a couple of months in order to optimize this and make it better, or do we want to just combine both of these DCs into one, right.

In a brand new building with no interruption to our, our current production so we can keep selling and keep providing to our customers and set ourselves up for, you know, 15, 20, 30 years down.

As, you know, the market does evolve.

Yeah, that's a great point, Julian.

And I was just going to add too, from the, from the Domatic side, you know, Southern Glaciers first of all, has a fantastic engineering team at their corporate headquarters.

Julian's a big part of that team.

But typically they have a really clear definition of the operational needs of, of their market well in advance of coming to a partner like Domatic for assistance.

But they will already know the needs from a capacity, a storage or a throughput requirement for what this market needs long term for their future success.

Right.

So then they can bring those details to Domatic and we can work with them to translate that into a working design and ultimately a cost so that they can use that, you know, kind of quantifiable data to do a proper ROI analysis.

So, so to Julian's point, the, the market in Louisiana, there we actually worked together to look at both approaches.

We developed a design and a solution for how would we expand, modernize and retrofit one of their existing facilities?

And what would be the cost and the operational impact of doing that versus if we were to build a greenfield facility, what would the design and the cost and the timeline look like for that approach?

And we can provide the, you know, again, the quantifiable data for both of those approaches so that Southern glaziers and their leadership can make the best decision from an ROI and from a business perspective.

Got it.

Got.

Julian, I'm curious then, based on what, based on what Nick just said then too, as you look at the logistics network as a whole outside of just even Louisiana, did you end up focusing in any one particular area more so than another?

Did did you go more towards like a larger size, trying to expand the size of the average warehouse operation?

Or how did you think about that?

Yeah, so I think it, it depends, right?

Usually at some point we get to this, to the stage where the buildings are at end of life, close to the end of life.

Right.

You know, the buildings in Louisiana I think are probably 20, 25 years old at this point.

So the automation and everything inside of it, you know, was preventing us from being as efficient as possible.

And I guess to add to that, you know, we had those two buildings and since those two buildings were already maxed out as far as inventory goes, we were, we did have an off site storage as well, just simply because we couldn't fit all of the inventory inside of the two buildings.

So that was also another major factor.

It's hey, we have these three buildings that we're paying for, right?

To house our inventory.

Maybe we consolidate under one roof.

And not only do we save money on, you know, not having to pay for the, you know, the, the building itself, right?

Three different buildings, we just pay for one.

But we also reduce the complexity of, you know, moving product from our overflow storage to either one of the two DCs.

Right now we keep everything under one roof and you know, if we need to get certain product, it's just a 10 to 15 minute drive through the warehouse versus 20 to 30 minutes across town to bring product from a different warehouse to another.

Right.

I'm curious though, Julian, like that'll make sense.

But then at this, by the same token, like, you know, if you're expanding your facilities, like there's going to be more capacity that you and more demand that you need to meet to get the throughput in that facility operating to the level that you want.

I'm curious, like, how, how do you best Meet that need going forward.

Like what other, what things you have to think about to, to make sure that you're not running with an unproductive building down the line.

And Nick, I'm gonna have the same question for you too.

Yeah.

So, you know, we obviously take the, the data that we do have right from, from both of our warehouses and we, and we say, hey, how do we, what does the system look like right.

In a new greenfield building, what rates do we need to hit?

And that's a big part of, you know, the relationship and partnership that we have with Dematic.

Right.

We bring them, hey, you know, Dematic, thankfully was in both of our Louisiana, our St. Rose and Lafayette buildings.

So they were very familiar with our current business in that market.

Helps.

Yeah.

So basically we go, hey, we've got these two facilities that you guys are very familiar with and we want to combine them into one.

What does that look like from, you know, an automation perspective on, on your guys's side?

Let's, you know, here's, here's the canvas, if you will, of the building shell.

Let's, you know, let's put together the best system that we possibly can to make sure that we're meeting the rate that we need to get our operations team in and out of the building on time.

Right.

We don't want to be working 15, 16, 17 hour shifts.

Let's consolidate that to 10 hours maybe, you know, on the high end, eight hours on the, on the low end and get everybody door.

The, the other big piece of your question there of how do you make sure that you're right sizing the, the building and right.

Sizing the automation system for what you need.

For us, it's all about scalability, right.

So, okay, when we work with Southern Glazers, it's, it's standard operating procedure for us when we, when it comes to the design that we're going to design for a system that's capable of supporting them for, let's say 20, 30 years, but that's not necessarily what we're going to build day one.

Right.

So, for example, in Louisiana, we built a system that the backbone can support 30 years of expected growth and volume.

But day one, we only put in about half of the capacity throughput that they need today.

And that'll get them to, you know, 10 plus years and then at that point we can add additional shipping downlines, we can add additional picking capacity.

So, so we try to build these systems modularly.

Is that a word, modularly?

I think so.

Build them in modules so that we can add those pieces down the line as the operation grows into them.

Right?

Yeah.

So Nick, paint the pictures for me then.

So like what, so what actually, what actually goes into that building?

Now you, and you mentioned a little bit on like what can come later, but even go into that in more depth too, because I'm curious.

I'd love the examples from audience too, of like, if you're designing a new flexible warehouse and you're thinking about it that way, where you're trying to build modularity into the design, what hardware and infrastructure goes into it today in the case of Southern Glaciers, and then what are you leaving open for tomorrow?

Yeah, absolutely.

So ultimately the, the solution that we designed and implemented for Southern Glaciers in multiple of their facilities, it.

It's what we would refer to as a conveyance sort system.

Right.

So, so what that consists of is multiple different functional areas.

So you would have various types of pick modules where order fulfillment is taking place.

You would have main merges where product is being sequenced and singulated.

And you have shipping solutions like a shipping main shipping distribution sorter and downlines that feed their shipping dock.

And connecting all of those different pieces is somewhere between two and three miles of carton conveyor.

Right.

So essentially, if you can imagine, one of Southern Glacier's customers, a bar or a restaurant, orders a case of whiskey, that whiskey is going to be stored in a pick module within their facility and a picking operator is going to pick up that case and place it on a dometic conveyor.

That case has been routed through the facility from their picking area to their shipping dock.

It's routed through a merge that does the, that gets consolidated with all of the other cases that have been picked in other areas of the building and sequences them in the right order to then feed the shipping dock, get it on the right truck at the right time so that it can be delivered to their customer.

You know what, what we've done to provide the modularity and expansion is adding additional pick module space for the future.

Right?

So in, in day one, there's two pick modules.

There's room to add two more in the future.

There's also additional doc space.

Right.

So day one, I'll be Julian.

There's 12 downlines, I think in Louisiana, In Louisiana, there's expansion capacity to make that 18 in the future.

The, the main shipping sorter is its full length, but only the doors that are needed for today are actually have equipment installed.

Does that make sense?

It does, it does.

And you know, oftentimes I get folks from you know, marketing and every walk of life listening to these conversations too.

So, so when you say a pick module, what is a pick module?

Nick?

Yeah, no, sorry, I, I forget sometimes that I'm so deep in the weeds on the.

No, it's okay.

It's great.

A pick module is essentially a rack structure somewhere between two and four levels tall with mezzanine on each level that, that an operator can work in.

And those rack structures house either pallets of product or carton flow with product in it.

And essentially it's a way to shrink down the travel path that a picker needs to travel in order to pick the orders that they need to fulfill for a day.

Right.

So all of those products are condensed into one smaller footprint as opposed to having that person drive around the rack aisles of an entire warehouse.

Got it, got it.

That's great.

That's great, Nick.

Thanks for that color.

And so it sounds like, it sounds like for, for all intents and purposes, there's a lot of capacity that you can still get out of the building should you decide to tap into it down the line.

Julian, let's bring you now back into the conversation.

Like, how did you decide, you know, what level of flexibility to still allow versus, you know, how much you wanted to put into operation today?

Yeah, so that, that goes back to, to, to the data.

Right.

We, we see, hey, we have an expected growth, you know, 20 years down the line.

And we extrapolate, we extrapolate that based off of, you know, market trends and we say, okay, in 2035, right.

We expect to be selling this much product in a given day.

So we plan for that.

And that's kind of the, the what we give ourselves day one versus year 10 versus year 20.

So, you know, and like Nick was saying, we try to be flexible and modular in that sense where, so in, for example, where Nick was mentioning, you know, we have the room expand and add another pick module.

Yes.

Later, 20 years down the line, that'll be a four level pick module.

But today, you know, we use that to, to store product.

Right.

We'll do, we'll do three high floor bulk in that whole area.

So like, like you said, we're not, you know, we don't have an unproductive or, or wasted space in the warehouse or, you know, we'll do a, a ground level conveyor line.

Right.

Conveyor pick module.

We'll only do the first level where we don't need the rack structure like Nick was mentioning.

And you know, we're still being productive with that space.

Yeah, we don't, we don't like too much, too much empty space in our warehouses and, and neither does leadership.

Yep.

Yeah, no, I don't think anyone does.

That's probably, that's probably, that's probably a good bet.

Unless, unless you just turn it through it so quickly.

But, but no, that's a great point there and I think it's good to go into, because, you know, the, the building's making the return that it needs to now and then still can make that return in the long run should the building need to expand its capacity and throughput.

But the other point of this too that it brings up for me is we've just talked about the physical infrastructure side of it.

Like the software's got to be a key piece of this too, Nick.

Right?

Like, like, especially with everything going on on the software side of things today.

So like what, what happened on the software upgrade side of building a new facility?

Yeah, no, you're exactly right.

So you know, the way that I like to think of it is all the, all the equipment and machinery that we just talked about, right.

That, that's the hands and feet of the machine.

But the warehouse control software, that's the mind behind the machine.

Right?

So Dometics WCS warehouse control software, that is what's making all the decisions regarding what to pick, when to pick it, how to get the right sequence of product to keep the operation moving smoothly.

Right.

And the WCS also provides real time visibility.

So you know, the, the warehouse operations leadership, they can be more proactive in how they run the operation.

They, you know, for an example, they can, they can see that one operator in a pick module is falling behind and they can see, oh hey, he's getting a lot more work than someone in another area.

I'm going to move somebody over there to help him so that we can keep things moving slowly and we don't end up with bottlenecks or things falling behind.

So from within the facility and within the automation system, the WCS really is the brain.

But I, I'd maybe lean on Julian a little bit to talk about the other side, the reverse side of the software coin.

Because the wms, the warehouse management system, I'd say is just as important to get right as the wcs.

Right, Julian?

Yeah, yeah, and I hate to be the one to talk up software.

I'm a mechanical engineer by trade.

So unfortunately this is the dark side for us.

But yeah, no, that's so great.

It's true.

The software is so critical.

Right.

And that's what's giving us the insights and data that we need in real time throughout production.

And like Nick was mentioning, our wms, basically our inventory control and management, right, it communicates with the Domatic WCs and, you know, they're sending messages throughout the whole night.

And.

And basically in our wms, in a normal production night, right, we'll have all the orders that are supposed to go out for any given day.

And as Dematic is sorting these cases down and they get scanned through our scan tunnel, they divert down to the doors, and they get scanned by our dock scanner to confirm that they were actually loaded on the truck.

A message will get sent from the WCS to the WMS saying, hey, this case was actually loaded on the truck.

It's good to go.

You're good to send the invoice once the entire.

Once we think the entire order is.

Is complete.

Right.

And this allows us to, you know, make sure our customers, number one, get the products that they actually ordered and make sure that we're billing them for the stuff that they're actually getting.

Right.

And not for, hey, this wasn't actually shipped to you, but we're billing you for it anyway.

So, you know, it kind of keeps everybody honest.

And, you know, there's no guessing on what did you get, what were you charged?

And then from there, as, you know, as we market on truck, it also will adjust the inventory and say, hey, you.

You lost the case from this location.

And this is what your.

Your new inventory count should be.

Wherever in the warehouse.

Yeah, Julia, this is really good stuff.

I mean, my.

The mark of a good podcast for me is always when I, like, have an epiphany in the moment as I'm talking to.

To.

To the people I'm interviewing.

And I. I just.

I just kind of had one.

And, you know, it's.

As you.

As you guys are talking about what we just.

What you just discussed and relaying it to me, like, it.

Julian, it breaks a mind to me.

Like, you have to really understand how your.

How your systems are working before you go and put the hardware into the building.

So for the executives that are listening that are managing a process similar to you, what advice you have for them to make sure that they get that step right.

That's something I've never overtly talked about.

The marriage on the front end of the software before you even put a piece of hardware into the building.

Yeah.

And, you know, these.

These projects aren't.

Aren't short by any means.

No, they're definitely not.

I think Nick and I Have spent probably the, my whole career I think here at Southern has been spent with Nick by my side on, on these projects.

So you know, we thankfully, you know, we've built a good relationship with Domatic even well back into the Glazers days.

Right.

Where we have that, that communication on the software side on what messaging needs to get back and forth, get sent back and forth.

You know, we get our IT teams involved because it's, it's a lot on their side too.

Right.

To make sure that, you know, all the, the types of messagings that get sent back and forth are, are correct and what Domatic is looking for and what our WMS is looking for.

So it really, it's just making sure you're aligned very early on in the process and know exactly what you're looking for and getting the right people involved and you know, kind of talking through it.

Right.

And that's from our side.

Nick, do you have anything to add on that front?

Yeah, I would just say the biggest thing that's made our software lives easier is standardization.

Right.

So on both sides of the fence there within the wcs.

I'll talk about that.

First we try to standardize that software interface, that software UI and how we communicate to the WMS to be the same in every project we do.

Right.

Or as close to the same as we can.

Right.

Obviously there's some customizations.

Not every site is the same, everybody knows that.

But if we can keep the message interfaces as similar and consistent as possible, it makes things so much easier as you go.

Right.

So I'm just thinking back to our history over the last 10 or so years.

Now the first site that we put Domatics WCS in talking to southern glaciers WMS was in Columbus, Ohio and we knew that there was going to be some challenges there that the first time you do it, it, it's a little bit harder.

So we had more support, we, we had more hyper care.

Right.

And after we got through that first site, the second site was a little bit easier.

Third site was even easier than that.

And by the time we got to Louisiana, it's basically a rollout.

Right.

Where that makes sense.

We all know how we're going to talk to each other.

It makes things so much easier.

Yeah.

So that would, that would be my recommendation is standardization is key.

The bet the more you can.

Yeah.

And keep a long steady relationship too.

I mean that's the other thing that sounds key in that too because you got to have the long standing trust in each other too to make that work.

The way you're describing Nick.

Yeah, the other part that makes me think about too, Julian, you made the joke about being an engineer, but man, you got to be an engineer because that's a lot of detail to sift through that you got to get right.

You got to like the details and engineers tend to like the details as well, so.

All right, well, as we close things out, I'm curious too.

And it sounds like you guys have worked very closely for a long period of time together.

What were, what were some of the biggest lessons you learned, you know, over the time trying to either rebuild or improve, you know, your existing infrastructure?

What were some of the potential, maybe even lessons, but like watch outs that you also uncovered during these processes.

Nick, let's go back to you on this one.

I can think of two things off the bat.

The first one I would say is a watch out around IT software and more importantly, IT infrastructure, right?

So what I mean by that is it's very easy for us when we're working on designing an automation system, right?

It's very easy to get in the weeds of the machines, the conveyors, the sorters, where they're going to go and organizing and designing that solution.

But oftentimes, especially in a greenfield environment like in Louisiana, the general contractor is working in parallel designing a building and all of the infrastructure that goes into that building.

They need to take into account what's needed for the automation system too.

God forbid, the worst case scenario is we go and build this automation system and the GC didn't bring enough power into the building to run it right or something.

So that was number one for me.

The second thing I can think of is really a credit to Julian and the Southern Glazers team because they do this better than just about anybody I've ever worked with.

And that is the hypercare support that we give to a site when they go live.

So this goes back to that standardization piece, but it makes it much easier when we go to turn on a new system at a new site.

Southern Glazers will bring an army of people.

They will bring representatives from every discipline experts from, from all parts of, of their business to site and we will live there.

And we're, and of course Domatic brings, brings every discipline from our side too.

And we will live there and work with, side by side with the site for the first couple of weeks as they get, get used to running the system.

But, but the big thing that they will also be able to do is bring super users from some of their other facilities that are already working with this system that have lived and breathed the, you know, the domatic WCS or the WMS or ran this process in one of their other facilities and they will hold the hand of the people that now have to learn how to run this, this process and teach them in real time.

It's just amazing.

And it made our Go Live activities so much smoother and the handoff and the ownership of the site came much, much faster.

That's really interesting too, Nick, because the Hypercare approach you're just describing, I never thought about this too, but you talked a lot about standardization.

But standardization comes also from having human insight baked in and the knowledge that can come with the humans transferred from, you know, facility to facility too.

It's not just software and infrastructure, it's actually people and standardizing the approaches that the management takes to whatever you're trying to do as well.

Julian, what, what, what, what would you add here?

What are some of the watch outs or lessons on your side?

Yeah, and like, like you guys mentioned, that is, that's the beauty of standardization, right?

Is we're able to take somebody from Columbus or Kentucky or you know, any of our sites where we do have the Domatic WCs and we can bring them over to, you know, Louisiana or South Carolina where we recently rolled out and say, hey, you know, these, you guys are living and breathing this system.

You guys know the ins and ins and outs of it even better than we do.

Right?

Because they live it every single day and you know, they can help train, you know, the guys that are new coming into it.

I guess in addition to that though, as far as lessons learned, it's important to get your automation vendor in as early as possible with the GC coordination because like Nick was mentioning, you know, they have to design a building around the system, right?

And if you don't know what the system looks like before you get too far ahead on the building construction, now you are reducing some of that flexibility in your overall design, right?

I know one example in Louisiana we had this.

There was an egress issue where we had the whole system designed, right?

It was good to go, we thought we were good.

And the fire marshal comes in and says, hey, you are 410ft away from your nearest exit and you need to be 400ft.

And we're like, oh no, we got to gain 10ft somewhere, right?

And the whole system is in a perfect spot in the warehouse.

Everything's designed around it, right?

So we got to get creative.

And now we're reducing what offices look like we have some funky stair designs to try to make the egress work so that way we don't have to revamp, you know, the entire system.

So thankfully, you know, we had a little bit of flexibility there.

Had we gotten them maybe in a little earlier we would have had a little more flexibility and could have avoided some of that, that heartburn.

Yeah, it was, it was brutal for sure on, on that front.

Well, better, better you than me.

That's why I'm an entrepreneur now, my friend.

But I want to go back, I want to go back to the hypercare thing because I want to play devil's advocate for a second.

You know, it's kind of one things I take Pride in at OmniTalk is, you know, asking you guys as frank and candid questions I can.

So the hypercare approach, like, there's probably some people out there that are like, why would I bring people from different facilities?

Like, why wouldn't I just create a system that can work day one and just see what happens?

Like, But Julian, you obviously don't think that's the right approach.

So why do you think it's worth the investment to send those people to the new facility to help them get it off the ground?

I think that ramp up is the hardest part of, you know, go live and ramp up is the hardest part and where you really need the buy in of the new workers, right?

If, if you don't have a good ramp up, that's all anybody remembers, right?

From a go live, everything beforehand could have gone perfectly smooth.

And once you ramp up, it blows up.

Everybody only remembers the blow up, right?

So I think for us, when we bring in, you know, those product experts from other sites, it gives the new employees comfort in knowing, hey, these guys are really invested in me learning this new software and you know, it may give them a little bit of pride and want to own it, right?

It's like, hey, this is really important.

I need to buy in and, you know, do my part to make sure that this is successful, right?

This is my new workplace and I want to be proud to work here, right?

You know, if we were to just roll it out and kind of say, hey, good luck, they're going to hate it.

They're not going to buy in, productivity is going to tank and now we're struggling on our ramp up.

You know, when we just did a huge go live and you know, that's never, that's never the, the outcome that, that we're looking for.

For sure.

It's a, it's A great answer and I think it's a great answer because the softer side of management does really matter when you look at long term success, you know.

And on that note, Julian, I'm curious, what, what are some of the results you've seen thus far as we close things out here around the overall network design?

Like what are some of the results you can share and, and where do you think things are going next for you all?

Yeah, so I know I can, I can speak for Louisiana, South Carolina.

We just went live was this May six months ago.

So we're still kind of, you know, putting the data together but everything's looking promising there.

But for, for Louisiana we've been live for a little over a year and a half now and we were actually able to double our throughput as far as cases sorted per hour.

You know, due to this consolidation and automation in the new facility.

Because of this, you know, throughput increase, we were also able to reduce our delivery frequency from five days a week to four days a week.

So now you know, we're doing the same thing we were doing before in less amount of time.

So that means, you know, a little bit more work life balance for, for everybody involved, which is great.

Right.

So where do things go next?

So yeah, I mean thankfully we have the, the expansion capability right in, in our, in our facility.

So we'll, we'll obviously monitor market trends as the years go by and you know, we'll reach back out to Domatic and say hey, we need a, we need to, to add another couple downlines here because you know, volumes going up, consumption is changing and you know, we have that to look to on, on the horizon and then.

Yeah and you know, we're always working with thematic and, and trying to, to come up with, you know, what, what the next best thing is.

Right.

Eventually all of our facilities will go come to the point where hey, it's time for either an expansion or you know, we need to reconsider what the automation is looking like in the building to, to make sure that we're servicing our customers the best that we can.

Yeah.

Nick, how are you?

How are you stay.

Let's close it out here.

How are you staying in front of everything?

Trying to get prepared for the future on the dramatic side?

Well, I mean, sounds like a good problem to have.

Never would.

It is.

Yeah.

I think we all know though that you know, the automation and robotics industry is moving at light speed right now.

So it takes right.

Constant, constant communication and I would say, you know, between Julian and I and the rest of the Southern Glaciers team, we're always evaluating emerging technologies.

So just right now I can think of.

There's probably four or five different initiatives that we're evaluating for possible new technologies to solve a problem within the building.

So it really does just require that continuous partnership, the constant communication and openness to talk about what are the problems, what are the new problems that we're facing, and, you know, what are the new emerging technologies out there that could potentially help be a fit?

And at the end of the day, nine times out of 10, it might not be a fit, but.

But we won't know that unless we have the conversation and we.

And we talk about it.

Right?

Right.

Yeah, you have that conversation, you implement what you think you need, and then that becomes the roadmap for the next standardization of the next building down the road.

Right, Nick?

So.

Exactly.

Well, that was great, you guys.

I. I really enjoyed that conversation.

You know, I always ask at this point of the interview, too, like, if people found it equally as engaging as I did, what's the best way for people to get in touch with you?

Nick, let's start with you and then, Julian.

Yeah, Yeah, I would say LinkedIn's probably the best way to connect if you want to reach out.

I would mention that we've Domatic has put together a really nice case study on the work that we've done with Southern Glacier, so I'd be happy to share that as well for anybody that like to learn more.

But yeah, reach out to me.

Connect on LinkedIn and happy to continue the conversation.

Awesome.

And Julian.

Yeah, same for me.

You know, feel free to reach out on LinkedIn and if you have any questions about, you know, our recent projects or, you know, what our.

Our roadmap is looking like, you know, always happy to chat about it and give you a little bit of insight as to, you know, what we're doing on our side.

All right, excellent.

Well, thank you both again.

Thank you so much.

That wraps up today's Spotlight series podcast.

And today's podcast was, of course, produced with the help of Ella Seward, and on behalf of Ella, myself, and everyone at Omnitalk Retail.

As always, be careful out there.