Automated fulfillment center

Project motivation:
Fresh goods

To supply its shops with fresh goods efficiently every day, Spanish grocery retailer AhorraMás collaborated with TGW to create a central distribution center for its range of refrigerated and frozen foods. The sensitive goods are stored, picked and transported in areas with optimal temperature control. Extremely short lead times ensure that the goods are fresh and of the highest quality.

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At a glance

Challenges
mastered

SHORT LEAD TIMES ensure the freshness and quality of the goods
INDIVIDUALLY TEMPERATURE-CONTROLLED ZONES for storage and picking of the sensitive fresh goods

INITIAL SITUATION

FUTURE SUPPLY CHAIN STRATEGY

High quality grocery goods are the top priority for AhorraMás. Therefore, the shops are supplied with fresh food every day. To offer customers the best quality, the groceries need to be processed immediately and shipped quickly after their arrival at the distribution center. The TGW fulfillment solution makes this possible. It takes into account the processing of the refrigerated and frozen product ranges, concluding in gathering products for shipment and delivering them to supermarkets in roll containers.

SOLUTION &
MATERIAL FLOW

GOODS RECEIPT AND STORAGE
The refrigerated and frozen goods arrive at the goods receiving area on pallets. The pallets are stored temporarily in the high-bay warehouse and further processed as quickly as possible to ensure the highest quality.
PICKING
Three manual depalletizing stations ensure replenishment of the automatic freezer warehouse for cartons and trays. To ensure the cold chain of the frozen goods, the temperatures in the distribution center are complied with very strictly. Refrigerated goods are transported from the pallet warehouse to four manual depalletizing stations. The goods are sorted according to shop order automatically by TGW's Natrix shoe sorter, which can handle around 7,000 cartons per hour.
OUTBOUND AREA AND SHIPPING
At three picking workstations, the frozen goods are loaded into roll containers and prepared for transport to AhorraMás supermarkets. The refrigerated goods are picked in batches for the supermarkets using Pick-by-Light, likewise on roll containers.

HIGHLIGHTS

AUTOMATIC FREEZER WAREHOUSE

Our automatic mini-load warehouses are particularly durable, enabling them to also be used in the freezer area. At -9° F, the cartons with frozen goods are stored and retrieved using highly dynamic Mustang SRMs, thus ensuring the high output required by AhorraMás.

KEY FIGURES

Number of storage locations: 50,200
automatic mini-load warehouse: 41,000
frozen pallet warehouse: 4,500
refrigerated pallet warehouse: 4,700
Throughput performance – order lines:
28,000 cartons per day
Approximately 700 roll containers

ABOUT AHORRAMÁS

Spanish grocery retailer AhorraMás, based in Velilla de San Antonio, has experienced strong growth since its founding in 1979. The company operates most of its approximately 260 supermarkets in or close to Madrid, Spain's densely populated capital. With its "neighborhood supermarket" concept, AhorraMás can ensure that customers can purchase fresh food conveniently.