Just one year ago this month, Cutter & Buck Canada (asi/47967, US 47965) opened a new facility in Brampton, ON, to better serve Canadian customers. It measures 75,000 square feet, it’s located just 10 minutes from Toronto Pearson International Airport and it currently houses 1.1 million units of inventory for Canadian customers.

It’s also a model of order-picking efficiency. That’s according to UNEX, a New Jersey-based order picking solutions provider whose Span-Track wheel beds are installed in the Brampton location. Cutter & Buck has been having such success with the entire system—of which the 4,000 wheel beds are a key component—that UNEX recently featured the supplier in a case study of a successful client.

Inventory from Cutter & Buck's Clique line sit on Span-Track wheel beds from UNEX; photo credit: UNEX

“Apparel from Cutter & Buck is contemporary and meticulously designed,” Mark Alexander, Cutter & Buck’s operations manager for Canada, told UNEX for the case study. “And so is the company’s new high-tech distribution center equipped with Span-Track wheel beds from UNEX.”

While Cutter & Buck has long been a popular fashion and golf/resort retail brand in Canada, they decided to go all-in and open a state-of-the-art location outside Toronto last fall.

“Cutter & Buck was doing good business in Canada, just from fulfilling orders at its locations in Renton, WA, and Hebron, KY,” Alexander told ASI Canada. “It was very seamless in terms of product crossing the border, but there was room for improvement in lead-times for Canadian clients.”

So when the company decided to build the Brampton location, they wanted to make it as efficient as possible. The primary drivers of the system are two employee-operated Jungheinrich Order Picker machines that are wire-guided (to avoid swaying) and GPS-navigated. The inventory storage racks measure over 30 feet high and the aisles are narrower than conventional ones, creating the equivalent of 80,000 to 90,000 square feet of storage space in the 42,000 square feet that’s currently racked. The planned expansion of the entire 75,000 square feet will give them the equivalent of 135,000 to 140,000 square feet of conventional rack space, and will be ready for business in early 2019.

An order picker in the Brampton warehouse navigates the narrow aisles of inventory to put together client orders; photo credit: UNEX

Using GPS pellets embedded in the floor, the inventory locations for a specific order are programmed into the picker, which then travels to those locations in the most efficient way possible. And it won’t pick something that’s not listed in the order, which helps Cutter & Buck avoid mistakes. Currently, the system locates and picks about 1,200 units a day on average. Alexander expects that to increase to 2,000 in 2019, and adds that there’s just one other facility in Canada that runs a similar warehouse management system.

“We’re all about accuracy, efficiency and speed,” he says. “It’s a very lean facility. A location this size usually has about 15 to 20 people working each shift. We have just five to seven in a typical shift. And when we expand to the entire 75,000 square feet, we don’t anticipate adding any employees. Just a third order picker.”

UNEX’s Span-Track wheel beds are located in the busiest aisles, where the majority of the picking happens. Boxes of what Alexander calls “high-velocity” (aka, fast-moving) merchandise are situated back-to-back on the wheel beds. Once the picker empties a box, the box moves forward to be replenished quickly, a process that doesn’t interfere with any picking that may be happening simultaneously.

“We keep everything very clean and well-organized, which I think is very important, especially for an apparel facility,” says Alexander.

Cutter & Buck's Brampton showroom has a retail feel, and provides space for sales reps to host presentations and facility tours; photo credit: UNEX

It also means the location, both the retail-inspired showroom and warehouse, is ready for visitors, including distributors and their clients. Cutter & Buck can host sales presentations in the showroom, and then show visitors how their picking system works. Every item in the Cutter & Buck core catalog is housed in the Brampton facility, and is made available for purchase as soon as the catalog is released without any lag time.

“We want distributors and their customers to have confidence in us, and we want to deliver the whole package,” says Alexander. “We love to delightfully serve our customer, and to give them an experience like no other.”

For more information, visit cbcorporate.ca.

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